


First Steps: Epilogue

by CrownBeed



Series: First Steps [2]
Category: Star Wars, Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Established Relationship, Explicit Sexual Content, Implied/Referenced Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Drug Use, Loss of family members, M/M, Pre-Star Wars: The Last Jedi, graphic depictions of mental illness, healthy relationship dynamics
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-23
Updated: 2016-04-30
Packaged: 2018-07-26 06:44:15
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 25,826
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7564213
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CrownBeed/pseuds/CrownBeed
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A longer-than-expected epilogue that follows First Steps full of porn, character development, and healthy relationship dynamics.<br/>With feels.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This story/epilogue has been posted, taken down, reposted, retitled, considered an unfinished second part and now its an epilogue. Please enjoy.
> 
> Suggestions for tags are always welcome.

“General. Uh, Sir, we’ve docked.”

Hux shakes himself fully awake from where he’d been dozing in the seating area of the shuttle and frowns at Lt. Mitaka.

“How many hours do we have before shift starts, Mitaka?” He asks. 

The Lieutenant makes a show of checking his datapad as the loading ramp behind him opens. Hux stands and makes a half-hearted effort to straighten out his uniform and motions for Mitaka to follow him as he descends the ramp onto the Finalizer.

“Three and a half,” Mitaka tells him, “four if we feel like testing how quickly we can get ready in the morning, Sir.”

Hux nods to a group of passing hangar techs and enters the elevator that would take the both of them to the upper habitation levels of the Finalizer. He waits until the doors are shut and they’re moving before replying.

“If you wish to sleep in, do so. I won’t hold it against you if you are two or three hours late for shift, Lieutenant.”

Mitaka frowns, “I don’t need to sleep in any more than you do sir.”

Hux shoots the other man a small smile, “Perhaps not, but you also didn’t need to be at that ceremonial party either. I really shouldn’t have insisted you come.”

“You said it would be good practice – that I should familiarize myself with such celebrations so that I can perform in a manner befitting a First Order Officer at any future events.”

“Yes, but I could just as easily have had you attend etiquette lessons by Azha.”

Mitaka grimaces, “With all due respect, sir, I’d prefer being tired for a day than doing that.”

Hux chuckles tiredly, “She’s not that bad.”

“She pinches my butt. Often.”

“I’ve asked her stop.”

“She still does it.”

“…I could ask again?”

Mitaka groans, “Why even bother?”

“You could try asking her to stop yourself, you know.”

“I’m a little afraid she would take that as an invitation to do something worse.”

“She respects people that are in charge, tell her to stop and she will. If you let her walk all over you then she’ll do that instead. She probably thinks she’s encouraging you to grow a backbone.”

“She’s your Political Advisor-” Mitaka begins and Hux leans his weight on the elbow he has propped up on the elevator railing so that he won’t fall as he casts his mind adrift.

Seven months earlier they had decided that the first step to take towards overthrowing Snoke was to get a hold of his chosen Political Advisor – Samira Azha – and convert her to Hux’s cause. Doing so was a rather simple undertaking; before Starkiller was destroyed Hux and Azha had gotten along well and shared a similar shrewdness when it came to dealing with others and gaining their respective positions. Azha was only a few years younger than Hux himself and though Snoke had basically shoved her in a dark corner of the galaxy until he needed her she was still a force to be reckoned with. One doesn’t become an advisor to a man lobbying for total galactic control by the age of 26 if they aren’t talented.

Less than a week later the Finalizer was on its way to the co-ordinates Azha gave them to both pick her up and conclude the trade agreement Azha had officially been sent to that planet for. Joji, as the local Jojee called it, was a system that contained several planets; all of which were capable of producing incredibly nutritional produce safe for human consumption. The only other planet Hux had ever heard of in the unknown region of the galaxy that was capable of providing even a fraction of the sustenance that the Joji system was capable of was Snoke’s Citadel.

However, the Citadel wasn’t populated by cities or villages. There were just enough stormtroopers stationed there to protect the droids tasked with farming the crops, the factories that turned that produce into military rations – also run by droids – and the warehouses that stored the rations before they were sent out on specifically designated shuttles to ships and semi-colonized planets under Snoke’s rule. Hux had long suspected it was this system that gained Snoke his position in the first place; it was certainly a big factor in how he maintained it.

People would do a lot for the hand that fed it. Hux surmised that those people would be just as willing to serve a hand that offered more.

Upon entering the Joji System the problem of Azha’s ‘security’ was quickly dealt with – those stormtroopers were not there to protect the system but to prevent Azha from leaving it and once Azha had been allowed time to inform the local Lords that Hux was there to  _actually_  strike a deal instead of attack or dither about wasting their time the Jojee were quick to lower their weapons.

Azha had been among the Jojee for long enough that many of them considered her an honorary citizen – a fact that worked well in Hux’s favour during his dealings there.

It wasn’t until they were face to face that Azha was willing to share what it was the Jojee had been asking the First Order for; previously she had been worried that she would be caught giving away what Snoke might consider sensitive information and sentenced to death; she had often spoke in incredibly vague terms when Hux called her on the comms. In the end it turned out that all the Jojee asked Snoke to provide was protection from hostile forces that occasionally stumbled across their system and tried to annihilate or subjugate their people in order to claim the territory for themselves. More specifically they wanted protection from a large slave trading operation that targeted the Jojee for their herbivore nature – it’s much easier to keep a slave alive when it doesn’t need expensive animal proteins to survive.

In return for this protection the Jojee were willing to trade their produce exclusively with Snoke’s Order and were willing to open themselves up for negotiation in regards to the idea of providing people to the stormtrooper program. But Snoke wasn’t ready to deal and hadn’t responded – Hux assumed Snoke was waiting for more loyal mouths to feed; he wouldn’t want to spare any soldiers for supplies he didn’t yet require.

But Hux  _did_  need that produce and he was more than willing to deal. So began the negotiations and when slavers came he tracked the one ship allowed to flee. Then he sent enough men to decimate the operation and retrieve any information that would lead them to slaves that had already been sold. When Hux had to leave the system to attend to matters elsewhere he kept in contact with Azha and the team tasked with finding and returning those lost slaves as often as possible to ensure things didn’t go sideways.

Hux didn’t just want to have a trade agreement with the Jojee – he wanted their loyalty and Azha had assured him that returning their stolen children would be crucial in getting it.

The party he had attended on Joji with Mitaka was a ceremony to re-introduce a High Lord’s long lost daughter to the planet and the tribe. According to Azha it was a momentous occasion for the Jojee and being asked to attend the private ceremony in addition to the ceremonial party afterwards was the highest honour they could give to show their gratitude.

So Hux had attended and chatted up the important people that weren’t too drunk to speak common and drank more of their strange airy wine than he probably should have. And when he left later than he had intended to he assured Azha that she had an office and rooms ready on board the Finalizer to which she replied that she probably wouldn’t be in any state to get on a shuttle for a couple of days, at least.

 “-I’m just not in a position to tell her to do anything, sir.” Mitaka concludes morosely and Hux pulls himself back to the Finalizer and out of his thoughts.

“Dopheld,” Hux decides he is far too exhausted by the night’s events to try and solve the issue of Azha’s wandering hands and cuts the conversation short as the elevator stops and the doors open “get some sleep and come in a few hours late. One of us should be at least semi-functional during shift and it certainly isn’t going to be me.”

Mitaka huffs as he departs the elevator, “If you sent someone to Torstein with a message requesting his return, I’m sure he would come sir.”

“I was referring to how much I had to drink tonight and the inevitable hangover I will experience because of it. What are you referring to, Lieutenant?”

Mitaka’s eyes shoot down to his feet before quickly raising to meet the General’s again with a spark of defiance.

 _It’s good to see some improvement at least,_  Hux congratulates himself,  _and someday I might manage to completely break him of that instinctive submissiveness_.

Hux was going to need a reliable assistant when he led the First Order and Mitaka was not only incredibly loyal to Hux but also intelligent, observant and comfortable with his station – he didn’t  _want_  to make life-altering decisions for other people, he didn’t  _want_  to lead. There was very little risk of Dopheld Mitaka trying to overthrow Hux the same way the General was going to overthrow Snoke.

He refused to fall into the same trap as Snoke; Hux wouldn’t lord his superior status over his underlings so that they deferred to his judgment on all matters for fear of life-ending retribution. He needed loyal supporters that shared his beliefs and ideals - not people that were too scared of offending him or too desperate for his approval to question any unintelligible decisions he might make.

Having Mitaka question him without fear was a step in that direction. Hux had been  _asking_  Mitaka to speak his mind for as long as they had known each other; now Hux  _demanded_  that he do so. Over the past seven months the other man had been showing great improvement.

“There are bags under your eyes that have been getting steadily darker the longer Kylo Ren has been away.” Mitaka says, pulling Hux from his thoughts again, “you aren’t sleeping well. Last week I found you dozing on your desk.”

Hux scowled and crossed his arms, remembering waking up with a sore back and drool all over his datapad “so why didn’t you wake me up?”

“Because you needed to sleep,” Mitaka rubs his forehead over his eyebrow, “you once told me that tired men make mistakes. You haven’t made any that I’ve noticed yet but unless you get more sleep it’s inevitable that you will.”

Hux conceded the point, but “what Ren is doing is important for many reasons, I won’t ask him to return prematurely just so I can have a nap.”

“Have you tried getting something from the med bay to help you sleep?”

“I don’t react well to sleeping pills; I would be drowsy the next day regardless.”

“What about-”

“Figure something out tomorrow, Mitaka. I’ll likely have no trouble falling asleep tonight. Go to bed.”

Mitaka hesitates a moment before sighing, saluting and heading down the hall in the opposite direction. As Hux makes his way to his own rooms he pokes at the skin under his eyes, absently noting that they did feel a tad puffy.

Sleeping pills wouldn’t help him sleep he knew; most conventional sleeping aids wouldn’t. The inability to sleep was an issue Hux had dealt with several times over his life but he wasn’t comfortable admitting to himself that the last time it had been this bad had been in the academy when his mother was in the hospital after his father’s death.

Hux knew the problem was that he was anxious. But that anxiety could be ignored throughout most of the day when he could think straight and work on moving this operation forward. He hadn’t noticed his advanced anxiety until Ren had been off-ship for more than week. Up until that point he had gotten rather accustomed to both working off lingering frustrations and worries with sex - thereby exhausting himself enough to easily fall asleep - and having a veritable heater in his bed most nights; he could never quite get his room warm enough with the thermostat.

He hadn’t realized that his sleeping issues were getting so bad as to be noticeable. He still managed to sleep a few hours a night, so he knew he wasn’t in too deep yet but when he recalled the mental deterioration he had experienced during that time at the academy he felt another thread of anxiety form; fear that it would happen again.

It had been so long since he had been in school that he had practically forgotten about it. The insomnia then had nearly put him in the hospital; he hadn’t been able to sleep at all. He had tried sleeping aids and alcohol and combinations of both only to experience every stage of their effects consciously.

He ended up incapable of forming a single coherent thought and didn’t make any sense when he spoke, the whites of his eyes turned red and burned constantly - as though he  _hadn’t_  spent hours lying in bed tossing and turning with his eyes shut tightly; trying, and failing, to fall asleep.

His mood swings had been horrendous; he had imagined himself tearing his room apart from frustration so clearly that he hadn’t been sure he hadn’t done it until he had finally been able to see clearly that his room was still in one piece. He had screamed into his pillows so hard in the early morning hours that he ended up coughing blood all over his sheets. Most memories of that time were foggy and he had never been able to truly determine what he had said or done in the presence of anyone else but no one had reacted too strangely to him and he hadn’t heard any unsavoury rumours about his behaviour afterwards.

When he had finally been allowed to visit his mother in the hospital she had been able to get him some mild sedatives from the doctor and he had managed to get his sleeping schedule back under control.

He really didn’t want to take sedatives again, they were incredibly difficult to get a hold of without anyone knowing and they made it feel like someone had squeezed his stomach in their fists; bruising it and forcing all the acid into his oesophagus.

He didn’t truly believe his inability to sleep a full night was entirely due to Ren’s absence. Even after establishing a sexual relationship and growing comfortable within their boundaries Ren still didn’t spend every night with Hux. The Knight kept irregular hours; sometimes he didn’t seem to sleep at all and Hux had made damn sure that the other man knew that waking him up by joining Hux in bed early in the morning would not be well-received. When Ren inevitably decided to do so anyway Hux had locked the other man out of his rooms for a week and refused to speak to him outside of work related topics.

The point was that despite growing used to Ren's presence in his bed it had never been a regular thing. Sometimes Ren would sleep in Hux’s rooms 5 nights out of seven, sometimes only two. Sometimes Ren would leave after Hux fell asleep; sometimes he wouldn’t leave Hux’s bed for anything more than a shower for days on end.

Sometimes, though rarely, Hux would grow frustrated with Ren’s absence and force the Knight away from whatever technical project he was working on in his own room/converted workshop, push him into the sonic shower, and then force him into his decidedly less comfortable bed where he always inevitably fell asleep before Hux could truly work out his ire. And Hux would let it go and fall asleep beside him because he had never slept in the Knight’s bed without waking up to Ren’s hands and mouth on him in apology for his absence.

And then there were the times that Ren did spend the night in Hux’s rooms but would crawl out of bed and sit in the space between Hux’s desk and kitchen counter with all the lights on. Eventually Hux would wake up on Ren’s side of the bed - the one closest to the door - with the light from the other room shining in his eyes and a chill raising the hairs on his skin.

The first time it happened Hux didn’t know what to do; he had been half asleep, sore from their earlier activities and mentally exhausted from working so hard. He had huffed a laugh when he came across Ren's hunched form; he wouldn’t have guessed such a large man would be able to fit in such a small space, especially with all his limbs tucked in tight to his body. Hux had asked the Knight what he was doing and when he received no response he had approached and found himself in front of the dead-eyed version of Kylo Ren that Snoke had dropped on him several months before. The only sign that Kylo Ren still lived was the rapid movement of his chest with each quick breath and the hand twisting in the hair at the back of his own head.

Hux had tried to get Ren to talk to him to no avail, he had tried to pull the Knight to his feet, but Ren shook his head and pulled his limbs impossibly closer to himself. Hux had eventually settled himself against the cabinet in front of Ren and wrapped a hand around his ankle. When he woke up the next morning Ren’s eyes were closed and the hand that had been in his hair was on the floor, covered in dark hairs that looked as though they had been pulled out – certainly the amount of them hinted at more than what might have been passively loosened if Ren had been obsessively twirling his hair around his fingers like Hux had assumed.

Ren had been quiet and morose when Hux woke him up and coaxed him into the bed. He hadn’t wanted to talk about what happened the night before and had only spent an hour in bed before returning to his room and losing himself in repairing broken datapads for 26 hours. Hux had kept an eye on him from afar; he had wanted to tear the answers from the other man but also didn’t want to push Ren too far. If Ren was going to get lost in his own head again Hux didn’t want to be the one to push him there.

It had been nearly two months before Hux woke up to the same thing. That time, and every time since, he had eased Ren’s hand out of his hair, threaded their fingers together so Ren couldn’t put it back and ended up falling asleep on the floor with the Knight. He still didn’t know what was happening to the other man during the episodes, but Ren had quietly thanked him one morning when they woke up against the kitchenette together so Hux figured he was dealing with it as well as he reasonably could.

Having Ren on board the Finalizer didn’t necessarily mean that Hux got more sleep. And the Knight had been so incredibly eager to be of use in a way that didn’t require his ability to manipulate the force that Hux felt like calling him back now would undermine all the time he had spent encouraging the other man to spend his free hours tinkering and doing what made him happy.

Hux didn’t truly understand what it was that Ren  _did_ ; all he knew was that the Knight liked to pull things apart and play with the wires and circuit boards. The one time Hux asked Ren to explain why he had two datapads, a sonic showerhead and a scanner from the med bay all torn apart and spread around his desk the Knight had gotten too excited by Hux’s interest and spoke so quickly that the General couldn’t quite follow along.

“So, wait, what are you trying to do though? What is the end result supposed to be?” He had asked when Ren had trailed off.

“I’m hoping to incorporate the scanning components into the shower – so that your vitals and any abnormalities are displayed every time you use it and stored. Then the medical droids could have something to reference for each individual patient and their regular percentages and the person using the shower would know they were getting say, a cold, before it actually formed and adjust their activities in order to prevent a cold from taking place.”

Hux’s eyes followed the movements of Ren’s hands as he spoke before looking back down at the mess of parts. Hux could follow software fairly well; codes and numbers and some basic structural designs were his thing. The hardware: miniature screws and delicate sheets of plastic, however, were not.

“Is that…possible?” Hux asked and Ren's face fell before he turned back to his mess.

“In theory…maybe.” Ren muttered to the pieces in his hand.

Hux had grabbed Ren by the chin to ensure that the Knight was paying attention before explaining himself, “I wasn’t calling your ability to create something from all of this into question. I genuinely do not know if such a thing is possible and I’ll probably never be able to appreciate the ingenuity that went into anything you build in here as much as I should because I’ll never be able to understand it like you do. Just like I’m sure you wouldn’t be able to truly appreciate the nuances of what I do.”

Ren’s brows had furrowed, “So you don’t think I should do something more productive with my free time?”

Hux chuckled, “The entire point behind free time is to do what you want with it… I would appreciate a list of the things that will need replacing – if you don’t put them back together – sent to the Quartermaster, if at all possible.”

Ren pointed out the boxes full of bits and pieces beside his desk, “Most of that is from disposal.”

“Yes, your collection has certainly grown in the last few months.” Hux had noted, “last I noticed you kept it all on the table and it was considerably…smaller.”

As the General settled into his bed alone for a much needed nap before shift started he recalled the entirely out-of-character bashfulness that had taken over Ren at that. Hux wasn’t entirely certain that Ren would ever  _not_  be surprised when someone expressed curiosity in his hobbies or took notice of his interests.

It turned out that Ren had made a habit of trying to repair broken equipment sent to the IT department years before Starkiller was destroyed but he had been too paranoid to do anything more complicated than that – Snoke had insisted that Ren’s time was better spent meditating and honing his battle skills than playing with things it wasn’t his job to fix.

Later, when they were in bed and Ren's long fingers were running through Hux’s hair the Knight told him about the hours he would spend as a kid figuring out how the buttons and lights on the dashboard of a speeder worked. Ren couldn’t remember a time when he didn’t find some measure of comfort in connecting wires and finding out what would happen. Hux had smiled into the other man’s chest, recalling Leia Organa calling her son chatty when he was working in the garage with his father.

The more time Ren spent with his tools and his tech the more advanced his projects became despite a habit of leaving them ultimately unfinished. That was why he hadn’t been  _entirely_  surprised when Ren had volunteered to create a means of communication between Torstein and the Finalizer.

Torstein was a single-planet system little more than a sector away from Joji but closer to the inner rim and therefore the civilized planets. It was also ripe with several varieties of metallic ore that were ideal for spacecraft and could be sold for a high price once smelted. Those same metals interfered heavily with long distance communicators and the First Order officers stationed there were generally only contacted if their designated star-destroyer left the area of interference.

Torstein was largely inhospitable; its land consisted mostly of stone and what little water could be found had such a high salinity that it was unfit for consumption by humans and plant-life – any and all foodstuffs were provided at Snoke’s behest when the shuttles that delivered the smelted ore to the Citadel returned with rations. Before the First Order had staked a claim on it Torstein had seen some pirate activity but the planet was often considered too much of a risk by peoples that could seek income elsewhere. This had made it perfect for an organization that needed funds but also wished to remain undetected by the New Republic.

Upon ensuring he had the Jojee in his corner Hux’s next move was to fund his own operation. Connecting with Torstein had not gone as smoothly as he had hoped – the last time Hux had spoken to the officers stationed there had been before the Starkiller incident and he couldn’t be sure that Snoke hadn’t spoken to them in the months since Hux defected. He couldn’t announce his intentions to parley with the officers stationed there so Hux had relied mostly on luck and had taken Captain Phasma, Kylo Ren and a few guards on a shuttle and had prayed to whatever powers governed such things to not be shot down.

They had safely docked on board the Subsidizer – the star destroyer tasked with providing support and protection to the large planet – and Admiral Starling had not only been glad to see General Hux he had immediately sent an officer planet-side to collect the two Colonels overseeing the mining operations to an emergency meeting.

The meeting had been tense; Hux had explained what he planned to do, how he planned to do it and emphasized the importance of their cooperation to his success – fully aware that if they decided to lay their loyalties with Snoke he wasn’t leaving that ship alive. This was why he kept a close eye on everyone’s body language while he walked around the room speaking and positioned himself in the best spot to deal with the Colonel that disliked what he was hearing.

It was a combination of his faith in Ren’s ability to stop any blasts before they reached their target and his own quick reflexes that allowed him to snap the Colonel’s neck before he could fully retrieve his blaster from inside his coat.

After dealing with  _that_  minor hiccup and reassuring himself that the remaining Colonel and Admiral weren’t merely agreeing with his plan because he had just killed someone in front of them Hux had left Captain Phasma in charge of his proposed operations. At that time Hux couldn’t provide the men and women on Torstein with a reliable source of supplies – his treaty with the Jojee was still new and he wasn’t ready to demand they supply another planet and star destroyer with food in addition to his people on the Finalizer. So, the miners were going to mix filler in with the ore and send that to Snoke instead of the pure ore they were going to process and store for Hux’s use while he dealt with the retrieval of the Jojee slaves and sent some of his best mechanics to Torstein in hopes that they could build a reliable method of communication.

It wasn’t until they were back on board the Finalizer and safely away from all other officers and personnel that Ren finally reacted to the attempt made on Hux’s life – up until that point he had seemed rather detached and uncharacteristically patient. Hux was heading to the holochamber to check in on Lt. Mitaka when Ren pulled him into an alcove along a nearly empty hallway and tried to pin him against the wall.

But Hux was still keyed up from ending a life with his own two hands for the first time in a very long time and he didn’t feel like being pushed around. So he jabbed a thumb into the inner elbow of the arm attached to the hand tugging at him and when Ren let go he dug two fingers in the space behind the Knight’s collar bone with his other hand.

Ren was so stunned by the reaction that he barely even winced when his knees cracked against the metal floor.

 Hux watched Ren’s pupils dilate and slid his hand away from Ren’s collar, the glove rasping over a lightly stubbled cheek to grasp at dark hair – forcing Kylo to bend his head back when the General took a step forward so that their bodies were flushed together.

“Did you need something Ren?” Hux asked innocently.

“ _Fuck._ ” Ren breathed so quietly that Hux barely heard him.

Hux couldn’t stop his lips from twisting into a salacious grin when Kylo’s hands twitched where they were held in the air – as though he had been about to pull Hux’s hand out of his hair but had frozen before he could.

“Is that all?” a chuckle rumbled from deep within Hux’s chest, “you could have just asked.”

Ren blinked at him stupidly and Hux sighed as though put upon and looked back towards the empty hallway, “There are other things I should see to.” The leather of his gloves creaked as he tightened his grip and turned his attention back to the man at his feet. “However, you have put me in a terrible position. I can’t attend to my duties with the image of how pretty you are on your knees stuck in the forefront of my mind. And I _certainly_  won’t leave you like this.” Hux moved his booted foot so that it was between the other man’s thighs and smiled when Ren swallowed hard and pressed his half-hard length against the General’s shin.

Then all at once Hux let go and took a small step back so that he could crouch in front of the Knight without touching him.

“How would you like this to go?”

“I want you to take me.” Ren had replied concisely.

Hux didn’t learn what it was that Ren had initially grabbed him for until they were both cooling off on Ren’s bed – it would most certainly need to be cleaned.

“That man was going to kill you.” Ren had said, apropos of nothing.

“Mm, that’s why I killed him.”

“Yes. That was…good.”

Hux snorted and slung an arm over the Knight’s chest, hoping to siphon off some body heat. Ren’s chest expanded on a large inhale and he let it out slowly before speaking again.

“I worry about your ability to not get killed if I’m not there.”

Hux blinked before sitting up angrily, “I’ve managed to survive thus far without your help, haven’t I?”

Ren had scowled, “That’s not how I meant it. I can’t ensure that you remain unharmed if I am not there to make sure you aren’t harmed.” The Knight reached towards Hux and pulled him back against his chest, “I know you exercise and carry a weapon most of the time but I wasn’t quite certain how to feel about your ability to protect yourself otherwise.”

“Are you trying to say you were impressed? You are doing a  _terrible_  job of not making me feel insulted.”

“I might have been a little impressed.” Ren murmured into Hux’s hair. “And I might have been a little turned on by how entirely unruffled you were by both a very real threat against your life and taking someone else’s.”

Hux snorted, “You do realize I have destroyed an entire star system, right? I’ve killed billions of people.”

“Ordering someone to fire a gun isn’t the same as being the bullet fired.”

“I know. This isn’t my first time facing down people that might prefer my blood on their hands than in my body.”

Ren hummed and absently stroked his fingers over Hux’s naked shoulder, staring off absently into his room. Several minutes passed and Hux was trying to convince himself to get back to work when the Knight spoke again.

 “I have an idea.” He said quietly, “about cutting down interference with Torstein.”

“You mean the comms? Why didn’t you mention it at the meeting?” Hux asked, rousing himself and sitting up.

 “It wouldn’t be easy to mass-produce, but having one would probably be better than none at all.”

 “It certainly would.” Hux agreed, “tell me about this idea of yours.”

“Remember when Phasma and I were purchasing supplies and then you punched me and we had fantastic sex?”

Hux scowled “I also recall yelling at you; I am fully willing to do so again.”

Ren breathed a laugh but otherwise ignored him, “There was a vendor selling all kinds of garbage that she claimed was from all over the galaxy and she was selling a necklace with what she said was a ‘diamond from the center of Coruscant’. The stone was actually a Kyber Crystal in its natural state. I don’t know how the vendor or whoever gave it to her found it but they had just…glued a string to it.” Ren grimaced, “it made for terrible jewellery; either way I bought it.”

Hux frowned “Kyber Crystals are used in lightsabers aren’t they?”

“Yes. I had considered making a new saber when I bought it… I’ve been distracted. That’s not the point. They are a focusing crystal – it isn’t until a crystal is claimed by someone wielding the force that it changes color and can be put into a lightsaber. That’s why anyone can use a lightsaber regardless of their force-sensitivity; a saber is charged by the force but the force is held in the crystal which is attuned to a specific person. The person that crystal is attuned to will find that saber much easier to wield than anyone else.”

“And you want to build a communication device with a crystal?”

“It’s been done before. All communication devices use electromagnetic waves of varying kinds to communicate over various distances – the higher the frequency the further that wave can travel across the galaxy. The interference on Torstein is merely blocking those waves and preventing them from reaching anyone else. The problem people who have used Kyber Crystals as a focus for those waves have faced in the past is that the crystal tends to focus the waves so much that they become nearly undetectable and travel too far too fast. But that is through space that doesn’t have anything blocking the wave in the first place. If I run in to the same problem with the crystal I have then making it smaller should help lessen the intensity of the focusing.” Ren’s eyes narrow at the General’s slightly blank expression, “how much of that did you follow?”

“I had a really good orgasm.”

Ren barked a laugh, “While we were having sex or just now?”

Hux grinned in response “I love when you speak science at me, baby.”

“Fucks sake, don’t call me baby.” Ren groaned and got up to find his clothes, “and I didn’t think you considered the force a part of science.”

“Technically all things are science,” Hux had replied haughtily; at Ren's unimpressed expression he added, “I don’t see how a person can connect to a rock but I understand the principles behind your theory.”

And so Ren had joined the team on Torstein and had spent the past six or so weeks chipping away at a crystal – which Hux had been assured was not as easy as it sounded – in order to perfect his communicator. The General had even managed to  _not_  voice his concerns about Ren being so far away and surrounded by people the Knight wouldn’t trust. He was afraid of sounding too sentimental or causing Ren to think he doubted him. Doubt in his abilities was the last thing the Knight needed.

In his cold rooms on board the Finalizer Hux reaches out to the empty side of the bed and wishes it was warm before finally succumbing to a short sleep.

... . -.-. --- -. -.. / ... - . .--. ...

The day after attending the party on Joji, Hux – hung-over, tired and perhaps still a little drunk – had spent most of his shift debating the merits of taking a detour to Torstein. He could even use the reasonable excuse of checking in on Ren’s progress and ensuring trade with the Citadel was still going well with Captain Phasma. But he couldn’t leave Joji airspace without his Political Advisor, so he had stayed and suffered through a day of staring blankly at reports and double checking numbers.

Several days later Samira Azha was settled into her rooms on board the Finalizer and she had spent every day since then meeting with Hux to discuss her ideas on things that he knew were important but he was still too tired to care about. His sleeping habits hadn’t improved over the last few days; he had even gone so far as to take a very weak sleep aid the night before but waking up that morning had been doubly difficult – he wasn’t sure the effort had been worth it.

His exhaustion, however, didn’t make him any less aware of his surroundings, “If you throw that piece of lettuce at me Azha I think I might actually kick you off of this ship.”

Instead of tossing the greenery across the table she smirked and flipped it into her own mouth, “Good to see you haven’t completely lost interest in all of this,  _sir.”_

He groaned and leaned back in his chair, pushing himself away from the lunch he had been picking at, “We can’t  _afford_  to change our symbol or do much in the way of distinguishing our troops from Snoke’s. This conversation is entirely academic.”

“But you  _will_  be able to afford it and it  _will_  be necessary. If you don’t want common people to assume you work for Snoke then you need to distinguish your people from his.”

“I’ve only got one system on my side thus far and another one on the way there – if you want me to waste time on color schemes and symbols then find me more backing so I can afford to paint a new emblem on more than 16,000 sets of stormtrooper armour and commission more than 150,000 patches to put on personnel uniforms. Until then there isn’t much I can do.”

“When news of what you did for the Jojee people spreads – and it will – you will likely find yourself with an influx of supporters – both financially and militarily.”

“Which is great but I can’t devote time to dealing with every woe a system has when I have not one but two armies screaming for my head. Snoke hasn’t had much to say about my defection yet but when he does he’ll try to squash it with a strong show of force. And to be quite honest I’m not sure who the Resistance would like to destroy first when they get back on their feet enough to start fighting again. If they learn of my defection they may go after me first – It’s no secret that I was responsible for the destruction of the Hosnian system, whether it was with Snoke’s approval or not.”

Azha wipes her mouth delicately with a napkin and leans forward as though telling a secret, “General Organa has it out for Snoke – from what I’ve heard she blames him for turning her son away from the light side or whatever garbage force-users call it. Regardless, she is more likely to direct her men to destroy Snoke for that than anything else. And they know that Starkiller never would have existed without his influence.”

“Or,” Hux counters, “she will try to come after us in hopes of rescuing her son. Kylo Ren has been mostly flying under the radar since Starkiller was destroyed and he hasn’t made any blatant public appearances in the past seven months. When it gets out that he is with  _us_  instead of Snoke, Organa may take that as a sign that her son can be saved and try to retrieve him.”

Azha frowns, “What makes you so sure that her people would willingly try to save Lord Ren? Its common knowledge now that he killed Han Solo; a man the Resistance and the New Republic have lauded as a war hero. Not to mention Kylo Ren  _was_  aligned with Snoke’s Order when the Hosnian system was destroyed – that would just be one strike of many against him.”

 “True, but they seem to be quiet fond of force users – of which we both know Kylo to be quite proficient in. And he  _is_  Organa’s only son – that might be enough for her to push for his rescue. I’ve not had opportunity to get a good read on Organa’s priorities – especially not since her son murdered her husband and she found her brother.” Hux sighs with disgust, “We know almost nothing about where the Resistance – and whatever is left of the Republic – stand these days. If you have reliable contacts, people that could tell us anything about what they are doing, that would go a long way towards preparing efficient defenses against them.”

Azha makes several quick notes in her datapad and nods, “It might take some time. I can’t just call and ask after all – I’m going to have to speak to several people and get their private thoughts on each other before I decide who can be trusted.” Azha grimaces, “if I hadn’t been left to rot in the middle of nowhere this wouldn’t be nearly as difficult.”

Hux chuckles, “If you hadn’t been left in the middle of nowhere you might not have joined me so easily.”

Azha laughs, “Of course I would have. You are much easier on the eyes than Snoke – if nothing else I have something nice to look at.”

“I’m more than just a pretty face, Azha.”

“Are you? I hadn’t noticed.”

Hux feigns being wounded, “That cuts deep. Here I thought you were all about brains before beauty.”

Azha opens her mouth to reply before her datapad lights up to inform her of an incoming message that she quickly reads “Oh good, the Jojee have a shipment ready for Torstein.” She explains, “We just need to send a shuttle to them to pick it up.”

“Well, if there haven’t been any uprisings among the miners yet perhaps food that actually has flavour will prevent that risk.”

“Did you implement the altered working schedule like I suggested? Two weeks on and one week off?” She asked suspiciously – she wasn’t used to her suggestions being heeded.

“Yes. Captain Phasma didn’t like it, but she promised to ensure it was put it in place. The messenger we received a few weeks ago brought along a missive from her – most of which consisted of arguments about the time that week off wastes and things that could be done to fill it. She did concede by the end of the message that morale among the workers was much improved between that and the addition of a few medical droids.”

“Well, they are working class citizens, not soldiers. Many of them have family on Torstein or other planets. If you wish to have a strong foothold in ruling the galaxy it doesn’t hurt to start with the little people. These war ships of yours wouldn’t have been built if it hadn’t been for the miners providing the materials and builders putting it all together.”

“Yes Azha, I know. You have used that speech several times since we came back into contact.”

“Well it’s a good speech. You know the importance of a good speech. You use them all the time.”

“Aw, you think my speeches are good? You are too sweet.” Hux grinned.

Azha’s dark brows furrow with indignation but Lt. Mitaka knocks on the door and opens it before she has a chance to speak.

“Sorry to interrupt Sir, Ma’am, but Kylo Ren is on comms – he’s on his way back to the Finalizer.”

“Mitaka, darling! It’s been  _so_  long, how are you doing?” Azha enthuses; her features sliding seamlessly into a charming smile as she’s presented with a new victim for her ribbing. 

Mitaka shoots a quick, pleading look to the General as Hux stands. Finding no help there he sighs with resignation “We saw each other less than two hours ago, Ma’am.”

Azha clicks her tongue as she leaves the room, “I know! Really you should be my assistant instead; my office does need some decoration.” She playfully swats Mitaka’s shoulder, “and don’t call me Ma’am, I’m not your mother for goodness sake.”

“I’m not letting you have my Lieutenant just so he can stand around your office like an ornament.” Hux tells the advisor as she leaves his office, “and I thought I asked you stop teasing him.”

“You did, I elected not to listen.” Azha says, smiling sweetly at a very uncomfortable Lieutenant.

“Leave him alone, Azha.”

“Don’t get short with me because no one has been tickling your pickle for over a month. Some of us are still trying to enjoy ourselves.”

“Mitaka, would you be so kind as to find me a new Political Advisor? This one is going to get vented.”

Azha laughs, “go talk to your beau, General. I promise to  _try_  not to entice your Lieutenant anymore.”

Hux watches her walk down the corridor with a scowl on his face – he had told her that his…situation with Kylo Ren was private and to stop referring to the Knight as his  _beau_ ; it was unprofessional and demeaning to the both of them.

Slowly he turns to Mitaka, “why do I put up with her?”

“Couldn’t say, sir.” Mitaka shrugs and motions for the General to lead the way to the comm room.

The chamber that once served as a means to communicate with Snoke had been refurbished into a base of operations for Hux’s organization. At some point the crew of the Finalizer started referring to it as the War Offices – and regardless of how tacky he thought the name to be it had stuck.

It was a large chamber – one meant to fit Snoke’s oversized hologram – and thus was easily turned into a two story set of offices and meeting rooms. The first floor was dedicated primarily to the offices – Hux’s sat just at the back of a long hall where the back of Snoke’s throne once appeared. The second floor was dedicated to several large meeting rooms; most notably the war room – with a holographic galactic map - and a soundproof room where Hux could meet privately with dignitaries on other planets or ships without having to meet them in person. The second floor also housed a comm room on a different frequency than the Finalizer comms so that Hux’s operations didn’t clog up Admiral Turner’s comms – he hadn’t mentioned anything but Hux was fairly certain there was a part of Turner that was extremely relieved that he didn’t have to fight Hux’s people in order to do his own job properly anymore.

When Hux enters the room with Mitaka in tow, Ren’s voice could be heard snapping at one of the receptionists over her headset. Hux sighs and puts his hand out, indicating she should hand it over – she doesn’t hesitate before doing so. When he first hears Ren’s voice over the communicator Hux resolutely ignores the hard thump in his chest and quashes the desire to demand the other man bend time to be back on board the Finalizer right that second.

Instead he manages to keep his professionalism intact by ordering the Knight to report.

Ren scoffs over the comms, “Yes sir, General Sir.” He mocks, “As I have already told your people I have designed a communication device that allows the Subsidizer and the men on the surface of Torstein to communicate between each other. But communication between the Finalizer and Torstein will require you to have your own comm. We tried to hail your crew but it would seem that the Kyber Comms can only connect to each other. So I’m delivering one.”

“Kyber Comm?”

“…I had to call it something.” Ren mutters, a touch of embarrassment in his voice.

“Right. When do you estimate you’ll arrive?”

“Twenty hours, give or take.”

“Very well, I’ll expect a report in person upon your arrival.”

Ren hums noncommittally before the line goes dead.

 _Twat_.

Hux hands the headset back and makes his way downstairs with the intention of getting back to work. He frowns when he realizes that Mitaka is still trailing behind him and looks at the Lieutenant questioningly when they enter the privacy of his office.

“You should take the next few days off, sir.” Mitaka tells him after closing the door.

Hux reels back as though slapped, “why would I do that? I’m trying to build an army I don’t have time to sit around and stare at the wall.”

“You do have time – at the moment we are only waiting on Azha to make some progress with her connections. This might be the only period you  _can_  take a break for a very long time. I’ll message you if something comes up that requires your immediate attention but you and I both know that the chances of that happening in the next three or four days is minimal at best.”

“This is my operation Lieutenant, I can’t just-”

“You can, you should, and you probably really want to.” Mitaka smiles, “Kylo Ren will be back and you’ve been working almost non-stop since before he left. Just …take a break before you work yourself to death.”

Hux narrows his eyes, “this is about the sleep thing isn’t it?”

Mitaka shrugs, “a little. Mostly because you didn’t pause for even a second before going upstairs to talk to Lord Ren.”

“Good lord,” Hux groans, “you’re as bad as Phasma.”

“Phasma is a formidable and frightening woman worthy of her station. I thank you for the compliment.” Mitaka replies straight-faced.

Hux stares at the Lieutenant, internally deliberating with himself, for several minutes before giving in, “fine, I’ll take a few days off. But if anything goes wrong I’m going to string you up by your intestines in the hangar bay and give Azha your head as a desk ornament.”

“I think she would much prefer my butt, sir.”

“…Get out.”

“Yes, sir.”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I based Political Advisor Samira Azha on Samira Wiley. I think of this photoshoot when I need to picture her.


	2. Chapter 2

When Hux had initially been in negotiations with the Jojee he had spent several months going back and forth between the planet and the Finalizer. Usually he returned to the ship the same day he left but sometimes he had to stay planet-side for several days at a time. Ren had often gotten snappy when Hux told him he had to leave – the shorter the amount of time between Ren learning of Hux’s planned absence and Hux leaving the worse Ren’s mood became.

Hux had nearly immediately seen the abrupt changes in temperament for what they were: Ren had difficulty with abandonment and was still fighting himself when it came to doing what he wanted versus what he thought others wanted him to do. So when Hux told Ren that he had to leave Ren instinctively interpreted that as a signal that Hux meant to abandon him.

They had been sharing a bed for only two months the first time those moods had resulted in an actual fight. It was late, the General was tired and Ren had not taken well to the news that Hux would be leaving for several days the following morning. Hux had told Ren that he was welcome to come along; he had just assumed that the Knight wouldn’t wish to – Ren often said he found politics boring.

Ren’s desire to do only what he wanted to ended up being twisted by the rage stemming from the fear of being left alone and he accused Hux of only wanting him there so that the General could keep a watchful eye on him or act as a guard. He had even accused Hux of only wanting to use Ren as an attack dog like everyone else had.

What had followed had been a lot of yelling on Ren’s part and a lot of confusion on Hux’s. Afterwards Hux had been rather impressed that Ren hadn’t torn a hole in the ship with the force of his rage. The Knight had claimed Hux only cared about what he could provide to his ‘operation’ and that Hux didn’t trust him to be left on his own. When Hux had pointed out that he left Ren on his own all the time Ren said he probably only did so because Hux was desperate for a break from him. Any words to the contrary were scoffed at and dismissed – nothing Hux could think of to say in that moment could dissuade Ren of the notion that Hux was using him and ultimately hated him.

Hux had eventually buried his head in his hands where he sat on the sofa and whispered ‘please stop.’

When he looked up again Ren was gone and he knew he would always feel a guilty twist in his stomach when recalling how  _relieved_  he had been in that moment. The yelling reminded him so much of his father and how the old man never listened to him – how everything he said was dismissed so easily it was like Hux couldn’t be trusted to voice his own thoughts or have his own opinions, like he didn’t know himself.

Hux hadn’t moved from the sofa for nearly an hour and when he did it was only to look for Ren. He once had put a tracking chip in the Knight’s belt and he cursed himself for not putting another one in his new wardrobe. When he couldn’t find Ren in his rooms he searched the hangar bay but turned up nothing. Hux ended up leaving the Finalizer without finding the other man and his entire trip was haunted with images of Ren tearing himself apart either figuratively or literally and his nights were filled with visions of Ren stuck in the dead-eyed, hair-pulling state that Hux had – at that time –  only once found him in. 

If it was common for Ren to get snippy before Hux left then it was routine for Ren to be practically desperate for the General’s touch when he returned; the Knight would be quick to initiate sex and would practically beg Hux to do whatever he wished regardless of what he might enjoy himself.

Much as it saddened him that Ren needed that physical show of approval and acceptance he thought he could understand it a little bit. He took a perverse pleasure out of knowing that Ren had missed him so badly, that Ren was so frantic to confirm that the connection they had was still real. Hux didn’t know how to make Ren stop seeing his leaving the Finalizer as a personal rejection, but he learned very quickly how to react to Ren’s need for touch and intimacy when he returned.

When he returned to the Finalizer after their fight however, he learned very quickly that he hadn’t truly appreciated how much Ren needed that intimacy. Hux’s week-long worry had quickly turned to exhaustion upon finding Ren unharmed and dozing in the General’s bed. He had had Phasma keep an eye out for the Knight the entire time he had been gone but she hadn’t been able to find him – the Finalizer was large and Hux hadn’t been willing to announce to the entire crew that Kylo Ren was upset and lost on the ship.

When Hux had shed the outer layers of his uniform and joined the Knight under the sheets he made the mistake of telling Ren that he was too tired for sex and just wanted to sleep. Instead of storming out or otherwise expressing his ire as Hux had expected him to the Knight hadn’t responded at all.

When Hux realized that Ren  _wasn’t_  going to respond he had furrowed his brow and lifted his head from where he had been lying face first in his pillow only to find Ren staring at him with large, petrified eyes and his hands clenching the blankets so hard his knuckles were white.

It wasn’t until Ren started shaking and his eyes went glassy with unshed tears that Hux realized what he had done.

“Shit, Ren.” Hux had muttered, quickly straddling the other man and trying to pry Ren's fingers loose, “Ren, I didn’t mean it like that. I still want you, Ren. I promise. I’m just tired and I don’t have the energy to – Ren, let go of the sheet, give me your hand. There you are, breathe with me Ren. I want you here, I want you stay, you’ll stay won’t you?”

Ren made a choking noise but nodded and Hux squeezed the fingers of the hand he was holding to his chest, urging the Knight to breathe with him. With his free hand Hux wiped away the few tears that had escaped and run down Ren’s temples into his hair.

“I don’t just want your body Ren, nice as it is. I want the rest of you too. I don’t leave you here to get away from you. Do you understand? If I didn’t know it would bore you to tears I would ask you to come every time.”

Hux continued to babble what he hoped was reassuring nonsense until Ren was breathing normally and his eyes were dry, though red-rimmed. Then Hux stripped his shirt off and struggled to remove Ren’s – the Knight looked at him like he thought Hux had lost his mind but surrendered his top regardless.

Hux manoeuvred them until he was mostly cradled in Ren’s arms; his face pressed against the Knight’s bare chest and his hand stroking the other man’s back. Ren’s breath caught when Hux’s fingers found the scabbed over burns on the back of his shoulders and Hux scowled but elected not to say anything. When Hux moved his hand back down to the small of Ren’s back and left it there the Knight buried his nose in Hux’s hair and began whispering apologies.

Hux held the Knight closer “its fine Ren. You don’t need to apologize. I’m not mad.”

“I shouldn’t have yelled at you like- I’m so sorry, Hux. I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay, I know. It’s alright. You can make it up to me now, alright? Just, let’s sleep like this, alright?”

Ren took a deep breath and tugged one of Hux’s legs between his own to tangle them together; nodding against Hux’s hair in reply.

Hux was half asleep when Ren apologized again.

“We don’t need to have sex for me to enjoy coming home to you, Ren.” Hux mumbled against the other man’s skin; he hadn’t remained awake long enough to find out if the Knight had responded. 

The incidents generally became less frantic after that. Ren would still get upset when Hux had to leave and sometimes would have to step away from conversations to breathe on his own until his body lost its tension. When Hux returned from his trips Ren still offered himself sexually; as though he continued to feel like he had to provide Hux with a reason to come back and that was the only one he could come up with. Or maybe it had become habit, Hux couldn’t be sure.

He planned to welcome Ren back in a similar way since the Knight had been the one to leave this time around. He hoped that making his desire for the other man as obvious as he could after such a long time apart might reinforce the idea that Hux  _does_  want him and – loathe as he was to admit it out loud lest he appear weak to the people who would consider it an exploitable weakness – Hux  _does_  miss him when they are apart.

So Hux heads to his office early, hoping to get as much work done as he can before his little vacation starts and strongly considering the notion of propositioning the Knight in his office when Ren reports in. He quickly discards the idea for another time – he would much rather take his time seducing the other man and not worry about being quiet today.

It isn’t until it’s almost noon that he realizes Ren should have already returned and he calls upon Mitaka for an update on the Knight’s status.

“His ship docked hours ago,” Mitaka informs him, “he had one of the dockhands deliver the…Kyber Comm upstairs and was last seen heading to his rooms. I thought you were already there, sir. I would have told you otherwise.”

Hux scowls to hide his disappointment, “Thank you, Lieutenant. Message me if anything important pops up.”

Mitaka doesn’t have time to reply before Hux is going back to his office to grab his datapad then heading down to the private quarters in order to find out just  _why_  Ren didn’t think to inform him of his return and vehemently denying any hurt the rather obvious dismissal caused him.

When he arrives outside Ren’s door it opens almost immediately for him. The Knight puts what he was working on back on his desk and rises, closing the door with a wave of his hand when Hux enters.

“You are angry.” Ren says monotonously “I could feel it when you were several floors away.”

Hux considers throwing his datapad at Ren’s stupid handsome face; but he also has a nearly overwhelming need to bury his own face in Ren's chest. He does neither.

“I  _am_  angry, thank you for noticing.” Hux snaps, “Is there a reason you didn’t deem it necessary to inform me that you had returned? You seemed perfectly fine over comms yesterday.”

“I was hoping to build a few more communication devices; for Joji and in case more are needed in the future. I also assumed you would be busy and that it could wait.”

As was becoming a rather annoying habit; Hux’s righteous anger fizzled out as he watched Ren try to explain himself. He was certain he could give lectures on the subtle clues Ren’s body gave when he was trying to hide something – a skill that had only been perfected when the Knight lost the helmet.

His shoulders were set marginally lower than usual – he wasn’t feeling sure of himself. He kept absently tugging on the shirt under his robes – he was anxious and uncomfortable. His body was angled somewhat away and the toes of his boots were pointing ever so slightly inward – he was closing himself off and didn’t want to talk. Ren also wasn’t looking at anything in the room higher than waist level, his brows were faintly furrowed and the left corner of his lip kept twitching minutely as though holding back a grimace. He was lying; probably by omission.

“What happened?” Hux demands after his inspection.

“Nothing.”

Hux tosses his datapad on the desk harshly; scattering the bits and pieces already sitting there and gets into Ren’s personal space to ensure that the other man had nowhere to look but directly at him.

“What? Happened?”

Hux watches carefully as Ren gnaws on his bottom lip and searches the General’s face; he seemed afraid and his eyes were practically screaming with grief. Hux ached with the need to fix it but he couldn’t if Ren didn’t tell him what caused it.

Hux’s scowl softens the longer Ren goes without speaking until he removes his gloves with a soft sigh and reaches for the other man only to have Ren take a step back with a firm shake of his head.

“I don’t deserve this.” he says with a surety that Hux rarely heard from him.

“Deserve what?”

Ren motions between them, “you, this, any of-I don’t deserve it.”

Hux frowns, Ren had shared such doubts with him before – he had a habit of telling Hux to return him to Snoke or insisting Hux trade him with the Resistance for their support in the upcoming war. Hux always told him he wouldn’t, that Ren was worth more than a bargaining chip but the Knight always seemed to come back to it. Never this strongly; usually when Ren brought up his concerns it was as they lay together in the dark – not when they hadn’t seen each other for a month and a half.

“What about what I deserve?” Hux asks the other man quietly, a frisson of horror overriding his concern.

Ren shakes his head and takes another step back, “you deserve better than the scraps Snoke has left of me. I’m not worthy of any of this, I’m a rabid animal; I’m only going to poison you, Hux. I’m not good for anyone; I’ve always been more of a burden than an asset. Whatever this is between us has been great – but it’s a fantasy and it can’t last forever.”

Hux doesn’t notice his nails scratching at his own palms as he responds, “Even if this doesn’t last forever is it not worth letting it die out on its own? Do I not get a say in any of this? If you don’t want me or-or us then say so, don’t push me away in some attempt to save me from whatever you think you might do to me.”

“You should have someone that doesn’t keep you up all night when they get lost in their head.” Ren continues as though he hadn’t heard anything Hux had said, “You should have someone that doesn’t have a history of destroying everything that ever meant anything to them. I don’t want to tear you to pieces because I can’t keep myself together or break everything you’ve been building because you spent more time trying to hold me in one piece than strengthening your cause; because I certainly can’t do it on my own.”

“Why are you so convinced that helping you is a hindrance to me?” Hux questions helplessly, “What am I doing wrong to make you think that I can’t handle my job and you? You are  _not_  a burden, how do I convince you of that?”

“I could destroy you without even meaning to.” Kylo snaps, “I could break your spine on a whim; you’ve told me before I have poor impulse control and we both know my anger can get out of hand. What happens when I kill you because I can’t convince myself that you aren’t trying to use me like everyone else has? And even if I don’t; you’re trying to save the galaxy from itself, you don’t have time to waste on making me feel better when I’m sad-”

“Do  _not_  tell me what I can and cannot ‘waste’ my time on.” Hux snarls, “If I want to stay up all night holding your hand because you think no one cares then I will do so. I don’t consider any part of you a waste of my time and I understand that you have a hard time accepting that I care; hell  _I_ had a hard time accepting that I was capable of caring about another person at first too. But I do care and spending my free time comforting you is a hell of a lot more important to me than spending all of my free time alone and playing with numbers ever was.”

Ren is quiet for several minutes, working his jaw in silence as he stares hard at the wall. Hux desperately wants to say something more but he doesn’t know what else to say; words are echoing around inside his skull but he can’t really grasp any of them. He thinks of his inability to save his mother and wonders if this will be the same. Perhaps he’s simply incapable of helping anyone, no matter how hard he tries.

 “I don’t know if I can handle it when you grow tired of me.” Ren says to the floor; the croak in his voice has Hux involuntarily moving closer. “You’re the first person in decades that has looked at me without any expectations. I was so alone down there, on Torstein. It put it all in a different sort of perspective. Phasma was there and we spoke about you sometimes, but it wasn’t the same. When I wasn’t working on the communicator I was flipping between absolute conviction that Snoke was going to find me and you wouldn’t know until it was too late and  _hoping_  that Snoke found me, just to get it over with. I can’t go back to the Citadel, not after all this. I wouldn’t be able to survive like that, not again.”

Tentatively Hux wraps a hand around one of Ren’s wrists and squeezes it gently. He deliberates with himself, trying to find the right words to say for fear that he’ll say the wrong thing and push Ren further away. When the minutes start to drag and Ren's loose hand turns into a fist and he starts to pull away Hux tightens his grasp and makes the decision to simply blurt something out and hope for the best.

“I would rather have you tear me to pieces than let Snoke do the same to you.” He says on a breath, “But I don’t think you will, I don’t think you want me to fail and I won’t let Snoke take you back so long as I draw breath. You’ve seen more of me than anyone else alive. That was a choice I instinctively made but I haven’t regretted it since – I’ve kept most of myself from others but letting those parts go in front of you was easy. I wouldn’t have even let that happen if I didn’t see you as something worth keeping. I gave myself to you because you gave yourself to me; you are mine and I will keep you here for as long as you want to be here but I won’t let you go without a fight. Whether I have to fight Snoke or the Resistance or you. I haven’t been given very many things in my life; but I appreciate the things that I get. I wish I could find a way to make you understand that.”

Hux’s eyes close as he speaks and his brows are furrowed but he feels the slight tremble build in Ren's limbs through the wrist in his hand. He experiences a moment of sharp dread and forces himself to let go when Ren pulls his hand away. He barely has time to open his eyes before the Knight is clutching at the sleeves of his uniform and burying his face in Hux’s shoulder.

Hux breathes a slow sigh of relief; clearly he hadn’t said the wrong thing. Hux barely had a real understanding of his own emotions regarding the Knight – trying to put voice to them was like pulling stitches, it was painful and it was difficult and he was never certain that what came out would be a good portrayal of what he felt.

He was so good at stringing words together to incite emotions and devotion in others with his speeches that he had once thought that would translate to being able to describe his own emotions as well. Little over a week after he and Ren had agreed upon a mutually exclusive relationship he had experienced an emotional upheaval unlike any he had ever known. He had absolutely panicked and had barged into Phasma’s room in the middle of her sleep cycle demanding she tell him what he was doing. Her first reaction had been to explain his plans regarding Snoke and he had laughed somewhat hysterically in response.

‘No, I understand that. That makes sense. But I don’t know what to do with all of these, these  _feelings_.’ He had told her, ‘I thought things weren’t supposed to be so intense when you became an adult and your hormones levelled out. I thought I had burned away these notions: these desires to comfort and-and  _care_ about an individual like this. Every emotion he pulls out of me is too big to fit into its category and I can’t keep everything organized when everything is spilling over – I’ve made a terrible mistake. We’re going to ruin each other, Phasma, we’re idiots; emotional idiots.’

After he had worn himself out babbling nonsense she had reminded him that he was a General of the First Order and just because he was overwhelmed by something didn’t mean he couldn’t handle it. He had learned to control his more overwhelming emotions when he was in the Academy and he could certainly give himself time to adjust to all of these new ones. Then she had pointed out that he was probably just feeling a small portion of what Kylo Ren felt on a regular basis and he had felt foolish.

Since then he had become more accustomed to the intensity of the things Ren roused in him; just as Phasma had told him he would. As Hux pressed his lips against the Knight’s neck and felt the tremors lessen he wondered if that was one of the things Ren and Phasma had talked about on Torstein. If Ren had determined this wasn’t something Hux truly wanted because he had initially been overwhelmed by it.

“Ren,” Hux whispers against the other man’s skin, “will you lay down with me?”

Ren pulls away and kicks off his boots without meeting Hux’s eyes. He stands quietly as the General pulls off his own boots and doesn’t join him on the bed until Hux opens his arms in invitation.

Ren straddles Hux’s thighs and lays his head on the smaller man’s chest – he grabs one of Hux’s hands and settles it in front of his face so that he can watch closely as he plays with the pale fingers; but doesn’t speak. When the motion slows almost to a stop Hux thinks the other man might have fallen asleep – he’s quickly proven wrong when Ren’s fingers tighten in his own and he takes a deep breath.

“How do you do it so easily?” Ren questions quietly, “how do you accept something like this without being overcome with the fear of it being taken away?”

“I don’t know, not really. It wasn’t easy at first, but I adjusted. Perhaps it’s just a product of the way we were raised. I grew up appreciating what I was given because the good things came so rarely. Whereas you grew up with a creature of a man that used the things you enjoyed as a weapon to control you. I never expected you to simply accept that I’m telling you the truth, not when you’ve been manipulated for so long.”

“What if I never trust you?”

“Then I’ll have to assume I never made you feel safe enough. You can’t trust me if you don’t feel safe with me and I can’t force you to feel safe.”

“You trust me?”

“Yes.”

Ren snorts, disentangles their hands and shuffles up so that he can speak against Hux’s throat instead of at his chest, “How? How can you feel safe around me? How can you have more faith that I won’t hurt you than I do?”

Hux smirks at the ceiling, taking care not to let his fingers catch on tangles as he runs them through the other man’s hair, “before Starkiller fell we argued all the time: I  _enraged_  you. I never figured out what it was about me that made you so mad, whether it was because Snoke let me in on your private meetings with him or because I tried to tell you what to do, but there was a short period where I would waste time thinking about things that would set you off. I wanted to see how far I could push your self-control; I wanted to know how deep I had to dig to get you off of my ship or away from my base permanently. It was petty of me, but I liked the way the air surrounding you changed when you were angry, I liked watching you leave knowing you were going off to tear my equipment apart.”

“I’m not following how that makes you trust me not to hurt you.” Ren murmurs while he undoes the top of Hux’s uniform coat.

“Because you never did then.” Hux explains, “Snoke might have punished you for killing me but he wouldn’t have killed you for it. A General can always be replaced and if you had removed my head it wouldn’t have been too great of a loss to the Order. But even when I was testing your limits you never so much as force choked me; you never even killed any of my personnel. You have better self-control than you give yourself credit for, Ren.”

Ren breathes a laugh against the base of Hux’s neck, “One of the things that used to baffle me about you was that you remained un-murdered.” He teases, “I hadn’t realized that you aimed all of your animosity at me.”

“Yes, well... you were a tit.” Hux grins.

“So, let me see if I understand this correctly. You have faith that I won’t kill you…because I haven’t killed you.”

“Well it sounds incredibly stupid when you say it like that” Hux snorts,” besides, you have less of a reason to kill me now.”

“Do I?”

Instead of responding verbally Hux flips them so he’s on top and settles himself comfortably between the larger man’s legs.

“Don’t you?” Hux asks.

Ren blinks up at him slowly – then his fingers are scrabbling at Hux’s jacket, shoving it off the General’s shoulders and tugging his undershirt out of his trousers.

“Careful, Ren,” Hux grins, “I do have to leave this room sometime, I would rather my clothes still be intact when I do so.”

With a groan the Knight thumps back on the mattress, “wear something of mine. Most of this ship knows we have sex anyway.”

“I’m not entirely sure anything you own will fit me.”

“Hux.”

“Ren.”

“ _Hux_.” Ren whines.

With a small smile Hux leans down and gently licks at the other man’s lips; when Ren tries to force the kiss into something more demanding Hux allows it for a mere moment before pulling away just far enough that Ren can’t reach him unless he sits up.

“When I sit back you are going to get to your feet,” Hux informs him, “you are going to strip then you are going to come right back to this spot. Do you understand?”

Hux is so close that he can see Ren’s eyes get impossibly darker, “yes.”

“Good.” Hux presses a short kiss against faintly flushed lips and sits back.

While Ren scrabbles to get his clothes off Hux gets to his feet and calmly removes his own clothing; carefully folding his uniform over the back of the chair at Ren’s desk. When he turns back towards the bed Ren is already in place, throwing his socks across the room. Hux eyes the pile of clothing distastefully but doesn’t say anything when he climbs onto the bed.

As he crawls between Ren’s spread legs he runs his hands up the outside of his thighs, letting his nails scratch the skin and leaving faint red lines in his wake. He allows his touch to gentle when he reaches the pale marks from lucky hits accrued in battle and the barely-there scars from when he used to hurt himself to connect better with the dark side.

Hux licks the still pink scar above his knee from Ren’s fight with the scavenger on Starkiller; watching closely as Ren’s eyes fall shut and he releases a measured breath. Hux bends Ren’s legs, digs his thumbs into the dip his hipbones create and bites the inside of Ren’s thigh when his legs twitch in response.

Hux ignores Ren’s hardened cock and leans passed it to nip at skin just above his belly button; he soothes the area with his tongue and keeps his touch heavy when he slides his hands up the other man’s sides so as not to tickle. Ren had once expressed his frustration when Hux shied away from the gnarled tissue left by the wookiee bowcaster so Hux pretends it isn’t there and ignores the full body shiver when his hand goes over the sensitive flesh.

When his fingers are curving over the other man’s ribcage to reach towards erect nipples and his mouth is at the bottom of Ren’s sternum Hux feels fingers breaking apart the product in his hair in order to scratch against his scalp and he freezes.

“Hands.” He snaps.

“Fuck.” Ren protests and Hux knows the frustration in the other man’s voice is aimed at himself rather than at Hux.

He doesn’t continue his ministrations until Ren's hands are off of him and gripping the sheets. Then he flicks one of Ren’s nipples in reprimand and Ren’s body tries to fold in on itself; his cock pressing up into Hux’s stomach and his shoulders lifting off the mattress. Hux is fairly certain he hears the tearing of fabric behind the loud gasp that escapes the Knight.

Hux presses Ren’s nipples into his chest with his thumbs and props himself up on his elbows; waiting for Ren’s body to relax again. He follows the taught lines of the Knight’s neck down to his collarbones with his eyes as he waits; absently wondering how long it’ll take before the flush at the base of Ren’s throat will spread down onto his chest.

Finally the muscles in Ren’s arms relax and he watches Hux carefully; waiting for him to move again.

“Are you going to behave, Ren?” he wonders aloud.

“I’m trying,” Ren huffs, “It’s been a while since you’ve touched me.”

Hux snorts and slowly begins moving his thumbs in circles over the still hardened buds, “I’ve noticed. My bed is too big without you taking up all the space in it.”

“You’ve never complained before.” Ren’s voice vibrates through his chest and into Hux’s lips when he mouths at it.

“You hadn’t been gone long enough for me to miss it.” Hux mutters against the Knight’s throat before sucking on his adam’s apple and flicking Ren's nipples with his thumbnails.

Ren’s moan is loud in the quiet of the room and his hips start moving minutely against Hux’s own, forcing their cocks to brush together. Hux snarls and pulls at the skin on the side of Ren’s neck with his teeth. The Knight’s hips jerk involuntarily and Hux only lets go when they still completely.

“Ren.” He growls.

“Shit, Sorry!” Ren whines, “I can’t. You feel good, I’m trying, I swear.”

“I know you are,” Hux breathes against Ren's lips, “you’re right, it’s been a while. But I want to do this for you. Please let me.”

Ren whimpers when Hux kisses him again, deeply and thoroughly this time. The General lets his weight settle in his own hips so they pin Ren’s to the bed.

The problem that presented itself every time Hux led their trysts was the nearly overwhelming desire to succumb whenever Ren touched him. And Ren always had a difficult time  _not_  touching – in Hux’s rooms they had leather cuffs that acted more as a reminder to watch himself than as a restraint; Ren could easily break his way out of them if he felt like it.

Ren understood that Hux couldn’t focus on him if he was being touched and Ren didn’t grab at him out of a desire to disobey or distract Hux from what he was doing – Ren seemed to enjoy when Hux focused all of his attention on pleasing him as much as he enjoyed putting all of his effort into pleasuring Hux.

It had taken a few tries to figure out what buttons needed to be pushed and in what order for Ren to fall to pieces and the more Hux managed it the easier Ren seemed to lose himself. Ren once admitted that he had begun to have faith in Hux’s ability to satisfy him without his own interference.

The first time Hux had managed to completely break Ren’s barriers he had been shocked by just how loud the Knight could be; Ren spoke when he was on top but he wasn’t noisy – when Hux had asked, Ren had said it was because he had a habit of devoting most of his attention and effort into pleasing his partner; picking up on their emotions through the force and reacting to what they liked; he barely acknowledged his own pleasure until his partner was satisfied.

Hux found that the trick to pleasing Ren was to overwhelm his senses so that he wasn’t ‘listening’ to Hux’s reactions to his body instead of paying attention to Hux’s touch. This was why Hux often had to bind Ren’s wrists; he had to keep himself as calm as he could until Ren was a mess. And Hux was  _still_  susceptible to those damned hands of his.

With a sharp bite at swollen lips Hux pulls away and pries Ren’s fingers from the holes they made in the sheets. Ren catches on quickly and latches onto the metal bars that make up his headboard.

“Can you keep them there?” Hux asks.

“Yes.”

Hux smiles and nibbles at the red mark he left on Ren’s neck; leaving small bites in his wake as he moves up to tug on the Knights earlobe. He holds himself up with one hand and with the other he pushes Ren’s head up by the chin and holds it there so he can try to leave a ring of bruises on the Knights taut skin with his teeth. He knows he won’t; Ren doesn’t bruise easily and any red marks left there now will fade in an hour or two but Ren always whines beautifully when he tries.

He moves down to Ren’s chest so he can lick off the salty sweat that’s starting to form, his fingers move from Ren’s chin to either side of his throat: pressing just hard enough that Ren can feel it when he swallows but not enough that he’ll actually choke. If Ren wants Hux to squeeze he’ll push up into the fingers but he doesn’t this time so Hux merely leaves them there as a reminder that he will if Ren wants it.

When he tugs on a nipple with his teeth Ren’s groan kicks up a notch and his hips jerk where Hux is keeping him pinned. He soothes the hard bud with his tongue and scratches four lines from Ren’s neck down his chest – studiously bypassing the freshest scars – and pinches the other one.

“You’re gorgeous like this.” Hux makes sure to blow cool air over the damp skin just so he can watch the Knight tremble beneath him, “I nearly stole a shuttle several times, just to remind myself what you taste like.”

“You should have. Fucking-”Ren cuts himself off so he can groan when Hux replaces his fingers on the other nipple with his lips, “I would have given you whatever you wanted. Anything.”

“I couldn’t decide if I really wanted to give you the satisfaction of knowing just how desperately I missed having you here.” With one last, hard suck Hux shuffles backwards so he can pay attention to the Knights stomach again; he moves his arms so that the Knight’s knees are resting against his biceps but his fingers can still reach Ren’s abdomen.

“I wanted – we could have – hell.” Ren’s voice waivers when Hux tugs on the short hairs of his pleasure trail and nibbles on his uninjured hip.

Hux smiles at the mess his fingers find the closer they get to the Knights twitching cock. He blows on it and chuckles when Ren whimpers.

“Hux,” he whines, “Hux, please.”

“You could have come to me, you know.” Hux’s lips brush against Ren’s inner thigh as he speaks. “You had a shuttle as well.”

Ren's hips lift off the bed and Hux’s hands snap to his hips to hold him down. He scowls at the Knight but Ren isn’t looking; he’s sucking at his bottom lip and his eyes are squeezed tight.

“Don’t move, Ren.”

He nods and Hux reaches for the oil the Knight keeps in his nightstand, leaving it within reach he kneels between spread thighs and circumvents the dripping cock to suck sharply at the delicate skin between thigh and pelvis.

Ren’s eyes fly open and his entire body convulses, Hux rests his hands on the Knights hips in case he needs to hold the other man still again and soothes the red skin with heavy swipes of his tongue. He waits for Ren to look at him before moving on.

Ren only manages to hold eye contact with Hux for a moment before he’s tightening his grip on the metal bar and babbling a litany of Hux’s name and ‘please’ to the ceiling. The words devolve into a continuous whine when Hux licks a wet stripe from the seam of his balls to the tip of his cock, pausing only to press the tip of his tongue gently against the leaking slit.

Hux holds Ren down when his hips try to follow his mouth and he quickly presses his upper lip against the base of the Knight’s cock, tongue stroking his balls. The muscles in Ren’s arms bulge where he’s gripping the headboard and his thighs are quivering with the effort of holding himself still. Hux laves the shaft of his cock, covering it liberally with saliva before sucking hard at the underside. Ren is panting heavily, the end of every exhale sounding like a half-formed please.

Tentatively Hux removes one of his hands and grabs the bottle of oil, “are you good?” he asks gently.

Ren makes a noise that may be a laugh stuck in his throat, “fucking hell.”

Hux pours some of the oil in Ren’s bellybutton to form a small puddle; ignoring the resultant hiss he recaps the oil and liberally coats his fingers. Hux tightens his grip on Ren's hip with his other hand.

“I suggest you don’t let any of that spill, Ren.” Hux warns as he gets himself comfortable, “I won’t be pleased if you do.”

“I hate when you do that.” Ren grumbles but manages to spread his legs further without disturbing it.

Hux spreads the oil on Ren’s entrance, his brow shooting up in surprise when the Knight opens up easier than he had anticipated he would.

“Did you play while you were away?” he teases as he works his fingers deeper.

Ren groans in response, though Hux isn’t entirely sure what the groan is in response to.

“Did you think of me while you did it?” he asks against the head of Ren's cock, sucking it into his mouth as he waits for an answer.

Ren moans loudly and bites into his own arm harshly instead of thrusting his hips; crying out wetly when Hux takes him as deeply as he can in his current position. He pulls out his fingers and covers them in more oil before working them back inside and carefully dragging his teeth up Ren’s shaft before letting his cock fall back on his stomach with a pop. 

“I asked you a question, Ren.” he says breathlessly.

“Fuck sakes, what?” Ren snaps.

Hux laughs, “Did you think of me when you fingered yourself?” he asks, brushing his fingers gently across the Knights prostate.

Ren growls, his hips jerk, metal creaks and the oil spills down his side. Hux mouths at his balls and rubs what he hopes are calming circles into his trembling hips.

“Ren?” Hux inquires, his fingers making obscene sounds as he spreads Ren open.

“Fuck!” Ren yells, “Yes! You damned narcissist, I fucking thought of you. Fucking-”

Hux pulls his fingers free and grabs the oil.

“Flip over.”

Ren doesn’t waste a second rolling onto his knees; he cracks his knuckles and shakes his fingers out while Hux slicks himself up.

He listens to Ren curse up a storm for a few seconds before he decides that he’s had enough.

“Bend over.” He commands. When Ren only falls to his elbows Hux puts his hand on the small of the Knights back and pushes, snapping out “Lower.”

Ren groans when his cock meets the mattress, the groan rises in volume when Hux drapes himself across his back, his slick cock sliding along his crack. Ren moves his hips, trying to get Hux to slide in but the General moves with him and grabs a fistful of dark hair. He wrenches the Knight’s head to the side and waits for Ren to give in so Hux can continue.

It doesn’t take long before Ren goes limp and another whine escapes his throat. The frustration twisting his features eases away and his eyelids fall as though he might be asleep.

Hux takes a moment to admire the angles of Ren’s face, the beads of sweat glittering in the artificial light along his shoulders, the feel of thick hair between his fingers.

Having all that power waiting patiently on him was absolutely intoxicating. It was nearly the same feeling he had standing on Starkiller just before it had fired for the first and only time. Like he was a god and he could twist and tug at the strings of fate based on a whim and a mere fancy. Like every life taken at his command was a life he had been owed and this weapon would deliver the rest he deserved. Every drop of blood spilled and every tear shed in his name would serve to construct his crown. And when he stood at the top of his empire he would bathe in his own glory, he would eat the hearts of his enemies, he would sleep on the breath that carried the voices that screamed their loyalty to the Order and he would fuck the force that was the man that helped him build his throne.

With those thoughts in mind and a quick, practiced movement Hux positioned himself and slid inside. He grunted at the sudden heat and pressure, his toes curling in pleasure but tried to keep quiet so he could listen to Ren as he groaned and whined and pleaded with Hux for more,  _move Hux, please, more, just move-Hux!_

He rolls his hips slowly and moves Ren’s hair out of the way so he can lick the sweat off the back of his neck. The Knight doesn’t stop speaking but the words come quicker and hitch every time Hux’s cock brushes against his prostate. Hux would love to watch every little twitch of Ren’s face while he fucked him but he had never managed to get the right angle to get the same reaction in missionary position. Ren couldn’t handle direct hits to his prostate; he was too sensitive – even this angle could hurt him if Hux went too deep too fast.

Fucking Ren carefully like this was torture to both of them but Hux cherished the way Ren reacted to it. The less coherent he was the longer Hux wanted to drag it out, the louder he got the more Hux wanted to make him scream.

It wasn’t until the first sob escaped the Knight that Hux tightened his grip in Ren’s hair and bit the back of his shoulder in the same spot he always did – right over three freckles that would form a small triangle if someone drew lines to connect them.

Ren’s breath caught in his throat, the sheet tore in his hands and he clenched hard around Hux; Hux froze, barely holding back his orgasm and hissed around the skin between his teeth.

Then Ren was gulping in a breath and his body was relaxing just enough that Hux could move again. He released Ren’s shoulder and slowly pulled out. Ren whimpered; too busy catching his breath to complain but complying easily when Hux pulled him to his knees and positioned him so that he could hold himself up with the headboard. 

“Did you come?” Hux asks, knowing the sheets would be wet where the knight had been laying regardless of if he had or not.

Ren leans his forehead against the wall and rolls it from side to side – so that would be a no. Hux applies more oil and presses himself against Ren's sweaty back; teasing the Knights hole with his cock.

He rests his chin on Ren’s shoulder and speaks quietly into his ear, “do you want more?”

“Please.” He breathes.

“Can you come without help?”

Ren whines and shifts his hips so that Hux’s cock catches on his rim.

“Ren.” Hux warns.

“Yes. Now. Please.”

By the time Ren comes he’s sobbing again and trembling like a leaf. Hux follows not long after and ends up squashing him between the wall and his own body. At some point Hux had grabbed onto the metal railing of the headboard as well and it takes several minutes before he can unclench his fingers and let go. Ren hadn’t been paying attention and he nearly falls before Hux pushes him back up and carefully lowers him to the mattress.

Hux grimaces when he lies down beside the sweaty Knight and realizes he’s lying in the cold puddle of oil.

Then he takes a moment to acknowledge that he is also sweaty, his hair is a mess, and his crotch is covered in a mangled mess of semen and oil as well. The puddle is really the least of his problems.

He lets his head fall to the side only to find Ren watching him; his eyes often have a particular shine to them after they’re intimate and Hux refuses to admit that it’s  _probably_ just a reflection from whatever lights are on at the time. Usually he’s wearing a hint of a smile, a smug grin, or some other expression that indicates he’s pleased – at the moment his expression is blank, as though waiting for something.

Hux, still waiting for his brain to come fully back online, reaches up with his hand and wraps his pinkie finger around Ren’s – he’s too tired and too warm still to do much more than that.

Ren’s eyes fall to where their hands are joined and slowly his expression turns contemplative. When their breathing is back under control and the sweat has cooled on their bodies Ren laces their fingers together and rubs his thumb along Hux’s index finger.

“I know it’s not easy” he says quietly, meeting the Generals eyes when he opens them, “I know it’s probably…frustrating, for lack of a better term. That I question your…commitment so often.” He swallows hard and tightens his grip on Hux’s fingers, “but it helps. When you don’t let me walk away or-or push me away because of it. Every time I find it easier to believe you. I want to promise that it’ll never happen again; but if I did I think I would be lying.”

Hux nods and squeezes his hand back, “I would much prefer if you didn’t lie to me.”

“I know.” Ren says, “much of what I’ve lost I had no control over losing. A part of me thinks it would be easier to push you away and have some control over your absence than it would be to wait for you to leave on your own – when it might catch me off guard.”

Hux turns towards the Knight and runs the fingers of his free hand over Ren’s chin, ignoring the stubble and sticky skin, “it makes sense, in a way.” He reassures, “If there’s something I can do, some way I could reassure you that I don’t intend to abandon you I’ll do it, I just need you to tell me what it is.”

Ren smiles and leans into Hux’s hand, “I don’t know if there is anything more you could do. Its…reassuring every time you tell me you won’t let me go that easily – it becomes easier to believe each time I hear it in spite of my behaviour. I fear the day you grow tired of it.”

Hux shakes his head, “I don’t think I can. I doubt any of this would have happened if I was going to grow tired of you. I’m rather invested.”

Ren smirks, “I suppose I did play a hand in your defection from Snoke. You were going to defect eventually anyway, but I seem to recall you didn’t make the final decision to do so until he told you to kill me. I knew you were the person I would be safest with after that.”

“Did you not consider that I might have done so merely as a tactical plan?”

Ren laughs, “I’ve no doubt it was a tactical play; but the intimacy of our arrangement certainly wasn’t – if it  _was_  you probably wouldn’t have just asked me that. You rarely handle moments like this tactfully.”

Hux scowls, “I think you may be insulting me.”

“I’m  _saying_  that if I wasn’t entirely capable of reading what you were feeling when we argue that I would probably be quite put off by how poorly you express yourself. You like to view everything as a tactician and you seem to expect everyone else to see things the same way.”

“You  _are_  insulting me.”

“You do sound like an asshole a lot of the time.” 

“…I’m having a shower.”

Ren barks a laugh and pins Hux to the bed before he can leave it, “I was trying to say that when you came to me after Snoke ordered you to kill me you were angry on my behalf and it felt…nice. But if you had defected  _just_  for me it would have been really quite confusing and suspicious. You’re so methodical you’ve optimized the best way to get dressed in the morning; I don’t think you’re even capable of making big decisions without putting a lot of thought behind it. You probably have plans for all eventualities at all times. But it’s still nice knowing that the tipping point for your defection was not wanting to kill me. I like knowing that.”

Hux lets out a heavy sigh and looks away in an attempt to hide his embarrassment “that’s all well and good, but I really need to have a shower. We’re filthy.”

Thankfully, Ren lets the topic go “I told you I didn’t like when you use me as some sort of holding dish for the oil.”

“Because it requires some sort of control on your part?”

“Because it  _always_ gets everywhere despite how still I am.” Ren corrects.

“Well maybe-”

Ren sits up suddenly, cutting Hux off “Aren’t you supposed to be working?”

Hux frowns, “I’ve taken a few days off.”

“You’ve taken a few days off.” Ren repeats.

“Yes.”

“ _You_.”

“…Yes?”

“Whose idea was it?”

Hux huffs and finally gets to his feet, “What makes you think it wasn’t my idea?”

“Have you  _ever_  taken a vacation before?”

“Sure I have,” Hux replies and motions to Ren’s bed, “you’re going to need new sheets.”

“I know and no, you probably haven’t.”

“You have semen all over your pillow.” Hux adds as he heads to the ‘fresher.

Ren narrows his eyes and follows, “this seems like one of the least optimal times to take a vacation. Considering the whole ‘overthrowing a regime’ thing”

“I’m not overthrowing a regime, merely enacting a scheme to replace the person running it.” Hux reminds him before stepping into the shower stall.

“When did I get a water shower?” Ren asks from the doorway.

“You were gone for a month and a half. I took some liberties.”

Ren rolls his eyes and sighs dramatically but joins the other man under the water.

“Oi,” Hux says, with a half-hearted shove, “there’s really not enough room for both of us in here.”

“Perhaps next time you’ll ask before using my shower then.”

“You didn’t even have a shower before  _I_  had it installed! Stop biting me, you barbarian!”

“Tell me who told you to take a vacation. Was it the politician? It was the politician wasn’t it?”

Hux groans, “It was Mitaka. He thinks I don’t rest well unless you’re here and that I should catch up on some sleep. And what’s your problem with Azha? You barely know her.”

Ren snorts, “He’s not dumb enough to think that we’re going to spend the next three days napping. And she looks at you weird.”

Hux scowls but manages to get his hair washed despite Ren’s attempts to distract him. He resigns himself to a cursory body wash and knows he’ll just end up dirty again later. They certainly won’t be staying in Ren’s room, not with the bed in its current state.

Thirty minutes later he’s sitting at the desk, skimming his datapad and waiting for Ren to finish getting dressed.

“I thought you weren’t supposed to be working.” Ren states, snatching the datapad and scanning it before turning it off.

“I was just checking in.”

“You’ve been gone what, two hours? Three?” Ren snaps, “I’m sure Azha has managed to not fuck your operation sideways.”

Hux frowns and stands, “seriously Ren, what is your problem with her? She has never been anything other than polite with you”

“I told you, she looks at you weird.”

Hux grabs Ren’s sleeve just as he turns to walk away, “what does that even mean?”

Ren huffs but faces the General, “did you know I used to think that you two were sleeping together? Back before Snoke had sent her to Joji and she actually attended meetings with us.”

Hux recoils at the idea, dropping Ren's arm in the process “good lord, why would you think that?”

“You two spoke quite often, you supported each other’s ideas consistently, she looked at you like you were a piece of meat and she hadn’t eaten in months. She still does.”

Hux snorts, “She also molests Mitaka on a near daily basis and refers to you as my ‘beau.’ I’m not entirely sure what the problem is.”

Ren snarls and forces Hux to back up until he’s pressed against the wall, “you are mine and she looks at you like she would enjoy nothing more than taking you away from me.”

Hux smirks, “she’s a politician, Ren. A flirty one at that. If she carries illusions of wooing me it would only be so that she could become Empress and lord over the First Order alongside me. If that is the case then all the power to her, I  _won’t_  be wooed into her bed and I certainly won’t be marrying her.”

Ren’s scowl loses a touch of its severity but he still doesn’t back away, “ _do_  you plan to marry once Snoke is gone?”

Hux snorts, “Why would I do that? There aren’t any monarchies I could marry into to make use of their armies, if I want an heir I’ll appoint one and I really don’t see the benefit of sharing the position of Emperor with anyone else.” Hux’s smile softens as he watches the Knight, “were you hoping to be my co-emperor, Ren?

Ren’s lip curls up in disgust, “I think not, it seems dreadfully dull.”

Hux laughs, “So you don’t want to be my husband someday?”

Ren chuckles, his annoyance forgotten “not if it means I have to share courtly duties.” He murmurs against Hux’s lips.

Hux kisses the Knight thoroughly before pushing him away and heading towards the door, “you can be my official consort then.”

“I will not!”


	3. Chapter 3

The remainder of Hux’s first vacation day in possibly his entire military career – excluding the few times he had been ill or injured and had been forced to stay in bed – was spent in his quarters watching terrible holovids that Ren demanded he watch, dozing, eating, and re-familiarizing himself with every single one of Ren’s beauty marks. It was possibly the most domestic thing Hux had ever done and he wasn’t entirely certain he had ever been so blasé about not using his free time to work.

He had nearly forgotten his datapad in Ren’s room and although having it nearby eased one thread of anxiety – the fear that he would be needed and not available in time – every time he tried to subtly scan the messages passing between the War Office personnel, Torstein and the Subsidizer and Joji Ren would pull him away. Mostly he used coercion in the form of his hands and lips, a few times he had actually dragged Hux away and then pinned him to the bed or the couch until Hux promised not to look at it.

The lack of work related stresses made him uncomfortable, however, and he had a hard time falling asleep. He tried sneaking out of bed to do _something_  but every time he tried to pull away Ren’s arms would tighten around him or he would knowingly ask where Hux was going.

So Hux lay in bed and tried to ignore the heat in his chest that he had been feeling all day; it felt like the beginnings of anxiety but he had no reason to think it was. Besides which it hadn’t blossomed into an anxiety attack and he hadn’t had one of those in over fifteen years. He did what he could to ignore what  _felt_  like shortness of breath but wasn’t and pretended it didn’t feel like the skin on his chest was red with fever because it wasn’t; he shoved his face between Ren’s ribs and the mattress so tightly he could barely breathe and fell asleep that way.

When Hux wakes up he is immediately disoriented by the dim light in his bedroom; he groans and tries to roll over but Ren appears to be pinning his lower half to the bed with a leg. Which is really rather offensive; a single limb shouldn’t be so heavy.

“Why’re the lights on?” he mumbles, pulling at Ren’s arm so that the larger man is at least blocking the light.

Ren chuckles, “because you’ve been sleeping for 9 hours and I think you might try to stab me if I let you sleep any longer.”

Hux decides that’s a ridiculous reason to leave the lights on and tries to ignore everything around him and fall back to sleep but Ren keeps running his fingers through his product-free hair and brushing the thumb of his other hand over Hux’s eyebrows and the bridge of his nose.

After several minutes of this Hux gives further sleep up for a lost cause, “Why’re you wakin’ me up then?” he grumbles.

“I’ve been awake for a while and I’m bored.”

Hux squints a single eye at him, “you’re a menace.”

“Your eyelashes are a lot longer than I thought.” Ren tells him, “I suppose that’s because of the near transparency of them.”

“You did  _not_  wake me up to talk about my eyelashes. If you did I will  _actually_  kill you.”

Ren smirks and rubs his thumb across the bridge of Hux’s nose again, “Did you know you have more freckles than you used to?”

“What are you  _on_  about?” Hux tries to swat Ren’s hand away from his face but gives in when the Knight only laughs and goes right back to it.

“Across your nose,” Ren tells him softly, “you used to have freckles so faint that they were barely noticeable. They’re a bit darker now, you have some on your forehead too; and the tips of your ears.”

“Have you been examining me?” Hux asks incredulously, “While I’ve been  _sleeping?”_

“Yes,” Ren smiles with his eyes and presses a short kiss to Hux’s lips, “You  _are_  very handsome; add the freckles and you’re rather cute.”

Hux struggles to respond to that and based on the way Ren’s lips slowly morph from his small, timid smile into his absolutely goofy, endearing, and entirely too honest grin he thinks that his inability to process being called ‘cute’ is incredibly obvious. There was something about the way Ren’s canines sat in his mouth, in the way his eyes scrunched up and his dimples framed his lips and chin that made it hard to look at this particular smile for too long.

Hux winds up pressing his face against the other man’s bicep and squeezing his eyes shut. He tries to keep his face straight so that he can properly express his displeasure but he knows Ren can see his lips are curled at the corners.

“I’m not cute.” He mutters petulantly.

Ren snorts, “No, absolutely not. Don’t know what I was thinking.” He murmurs before sucking gently on Hux’s exposed neck.

“It’s from the sun.” Hux explains.

“Hmm?” Ren's mouth moves on to sucking at Hux’s shoulder.

“On Joji.” Hux says, shifting so that Ren could reach more of his skin. “I didn’t spend much time outside – they live in a mountain – but I spent more time in the sun than usual.”

Ren hums and his hand follows the curve of Hux’s spine before cupping his backside and pulling their hips flush together. Hux mouths at Ren's bicep as his cock hardens fully where he’s grinding against the Knight’s hip.

“Did you have them as a kid?” Ren asks.

Hux tries to remember what they had been talking about, “what?”

“Freckles.” Ren clarifies; shifting so that he’s kneeling between Hux’s spread legs.

“I didn’t see the sun much,” Hux manages before he’s moaning at Ren's fingers entering him. He’s still stretched and rather messy from the night before so Ren doesn’t wait long before he’s pressing his cock inside.

Ren pauses with a barely audible groan when he bottoms out and lifts his head to search Hux’s eyes. He still has one hand buried in Hux’s hair and he gently rubs the pads of his fingers against Hux’s scalp. He traces Hux’s jawline with the thumb of his other hand and keeps his weight from crushing the General by supporting himself on his elbows. Even so when he presses his mouth against Hux’s lips their skin is flushed together and Hux gasps when Ren gently sucks on his bottom lip and carefully moves his hips.

Ren fucks him slowly, as though he’s afraid of breaking him despite the way he had handled Hux the night before. Hux can’t stop gasping, the burning feeling in his chest is back and it must have spread to his eyes because he feels like he might cry. He wants to hide his face so that Ren won’t know if he does but the Knight keeps massaging his scalp and rubbing his thumb against Hux’s cheek. He keeps watching, as though he can see everything inside of Hux and he finds it absolutely fascinating.

Eventually Ren reaches between them and brings Hux to the most languid orgasm he has ever experienced. Then Ren is kissing Hux’s neck and coming with a quiet shudder inside of him.

Hux doesn’t move even when Ren pulls out, which appears to be fine. He blinks at the ceiling, tries to remember how to breathe and convinces himself that this isn’t the most terrifying thing that he has ever experienced. He doesn’t know how much time passes before he realizes that he’s probably the reason Ren hasn’t moved away; the muscles in his arms are cramping from how tightly he’s holding the Knight and Ren is pressing soft kisses to his neck and rubbing reassuring circles on his temples.

It takes some work but he manages to convince his arms to relax and when Ren raises his head with a cocked eyebrow Hux shrugs and forces himself to meet the Knight’s eyes.

“I think,” he croaks, coughs and tries again, “I think I need to have a shower.”

Ren sceptically searches his face but nods and rolls away. Hux makes sure to take his time stretching and getting out of bed, wiping away the majority of the mess before looking back at Ren. It wouldn’t do to look as though he’s fleeing.

“You’re not coming?” he asks

“I had one while you were asleep.”

Hux snorts but breathes a sigh of relief as he exits the room – whatever just happened was intense and burning and it didn’t hurt but it aches and he doesn’t understand. He doesn’t want to understand, not yet, it’s too much too fast but his bones are screaming for more and he had dealt with this before, he had gone to Phasma and they had talked about it and he had compartmentalized it and it was good; he could deal with that. Nobody ever told him it could get worse, that you could care for someone and feel practically consumed with the desire to protect them and then that desire would get  _stronger_.

Hux forces his hands steady as he turns on the shower and washes away dried sweat and drying come. He’s  _the_  General of the First Order. He wasn’t supposed to fall to his own feelings like this; order, galactic prosperity and growth, his dreams of unifying the galaxy – nothing was supposed to be more important to him than that.

He had lost track, months ago, of what precisely was driving him to keep going after Snoke’s position. The odds weren’t in his favour, not exactly. He was basing his success more on the faith that people would prefer he lead them and that Ren’s reputation would serve as a point in his favour than on any real backing. But Ren’s reputation was dwindling and Hux couldn’t make himself send the Knight into the field to decimate whoever stood in their way when Ren wanted to do something,  _anything_  else. Ren had been nothing more than a weapon to too many people and Hux was too…he liked…Hux wanted to give the man more than that.

The part of Hux that carried him through the ranks and kept him at the top screamed at the waste; Ren was a vengeful god on the battlefield, a one-man army and he could win this war on his own if he had enough faith in himself. But this new part of Hux – it was soft, it was gentle and it was needy. He hated how much its strength scared him; he felt weak when it was overwhelming but the ache felt like something he had always needed was fitting into a hole he didn’t know he had and he refused to try pulling it out so he could be as cold as he was before. He would rather give himself to the Resistance than feel that emptiness again. Hux didn’t even know any more if he was fighting to accomplish dreams he’d had for most of his life or to give Ren a world where he didn’t feel like he was being hunted anymore.

Hux watched the shampoo suds swirl around the drain and sighed. He either needed to figure out how to deal with these overwhelming moments fast or he needed to shove it somewhere in the back of his mind so he could try to parse it later – he didn’t trust himself to deal with it in front of Ren. The last thing the Knight needed was to know how incredibly terrified Hux was.

... . -.-. --- -. -.. / ... - . .--. ... 

When Hux returns from his long shower he finds Ren lazing about in his underwear and reading from a datapad. He orders a breakfast of local Joji fruit because he’s decided since it’s his vacation he can treat himself. Ren smirks from where he’s sitting on one of the couches but doesn’t otherwise respond as Hux goes around the room picking up from the night before. The Knight huffs when Hux knocks his legs out of the way so that he can return the duvet to its proper spot on the bed but makes no move to help and as Hux remakes the bed he wonders what he would do if Ren successfully pushed him away after all of this.

It doesn’t matter what they have; not really, the results are the same regardless. He doesn’t feel so tense with the other man around, there was a constant ache in his shoulders that he hadn’t noticed was gone until Ren was away again and it came back. He didn’t think he would ever truly know whether it was because he fully committed to overthrowing Snoke or because he had started… _this_  with Ren but he felt like he was settling into his place in the galaxy. He hadn’t quite reached it yet, but he was more satisfied with his life now than he had ever been.

Ren was an enigma… but he wasn’t. He was the biggest contradiction Hux had ever encountered and the easiest to understand. Ren was a mess, always and yet Hux found him admirable. Hux didn’t usually feel emotion, not like this, everything was supposed to be muted because he couldn’t risk losing himself to them.

Ren always managed to bring himself back from his explosive feelings; Hux had no reason to believe he could do the same.

Hux jumps when thick arms wrap themselves around his stomach and Ren perches his chin on Hux’s shoulder. He tries to turn around but the arms stop him and he catches sight of the bowl containing diced fruit on the dresser and assumes the culinary droid had arrived.

“Are you staring at the bed because you are reminiscing or are you planning on feeding me pieces of fruit on it?”

Hux snorts, “You’re my consort aren’t you, shouldn’t you be feeding  _me_  fruit?”

“Oh yes, Supreme Leader, let me feed you fruit. Nothing would make me happier than to see to your every desire.” Ren mocks derisively.

Hux grimaces, “not Supreme Leader, good lord, anything but that.”

“King?”

“Kings tend to rule over things much smaller than the galaxy.”

“Fair enough,” Ren motions for Hux to sit on the bed then joins him with the bowl, “you could just go with Lord.”

Hux makes a noise of disgust, thinking of all the times he’s heard Ren referred to as a lord and how little respect the title garnered him.

Ren chuckles “I suppose you’ll be going with Emperor then.”

Hux frowns, “I dislike the association it might have with Palpatine for some people – I don’t imagine the New Republic have painted him in a favourable light – but it would be much more palatable than Supreme Leader, especially with the more recent emergence of Snoke.” Hux selects a rather crunchy cube of something green, decides he likes it and looks up to find Ren watching him oddly, “what?” he asks.

“You think too much.” Ren accuses, “about everything.”

Hux laughs, “You say it like thinking is a bad thing. I find many people don’t do it often enough.”

Ren concedes the point with a nod.

“Last night I was thinking about yesterday and your… anger.” Hux says carefully “Have you ever tried controlling it so that it’s not so explosive?”

Ren doesn’t answer immediately, a deep-set frown marring his face and Hux wonders if he had made a mistake bringing it up. But he had spent much of the previous night thinking about it when he was trying to fall asleep. The silence stretches so long that Hux starts picking at the fruit instead of eating it before Ren finally answers.

“I don’t know how to stop it. It’s become instinctual at this point; to turn as much as I can into rage.” He smiles self-deprecatingly, “anger generally meant some measure of success in my attempts to reinforce my connection with the dark side. I’ve tried holding in the anger or pushing it away, but it’s only ever made the inevitable explosion much more severe.”

“In the past year or so you haven’t exactly gone around shoving your lightsaber into everything, so clearly not everything makes you angry.”

Ren shakes his head, “it’s not like that. I would take whatever I was feeling…like disappointment for example, then think of all the ways that disappointment could lead to failure and if it was applicable I would think about how it wasn’t my fault and I would be punished for someone else’s failures. It’s not…I can’t describe it properly. Different thoughts applied to different situations, it got to the point I barely acknowledged my initial reaction to something, I just focused on all the ways it could go poorly for me and how angry that made me.”

Hux ruminates on this for a moment, “is identifying your emotions easy then?”

“It was a necessity I learned with Snoke to focus on the rage,” Ren shrugs, “since the last time I was at the citadel I’ve become fairly good at recognizing the rationality of my own emotions. The initial ones, I mean. Sometimes I still instinctively turn to anger, but I’ve gotten better at recognizing when anger is an irrational response to something. I’m having…difficulties doing anything with that knowledge, though. My emotions often overpower what I know to be reasonable – Snoke exacerbated that habit. I’ve told you before about how he wanted me to give in to the emotions on the negative end of the spectrum in order to fuel the force inside of me. I’ve done it for so long that it’s easy now to get lost in it and harder not to.

“Whenever he sent me away from the Citadel the harder I had to push myself to get angry and the more I forced myself into a rage in reaction to small things. I drew most of my rage from fear of what would happen to me if he threw me away, or what he would do if I failed him.” Ren chuckles, “I used to look forward to returning to the Citadel so I could regain what I thought of as ‘my equilibrium’. I don’t even know what that means anymore.”

Hux moves the remnants of their breakfast to the nightstand and pushes Ren down so that they can lay on their backs beside each other, “Do you know any calming exercises?” he asks when they’re both comfortable.

Ren snorts, “I must have learned some as a child, but no, I don’ remember any of them.”

“There’s a breathing technique, I think it’s called the 7-4-8 rule or some such nonsense.” Hux explains, “You hold your tongue against the back of your upper front teeth and breathe in for seven seconds through your nose, hold that breath for four seconds then let it go forcefully for eight seconds. If it’s done properly you’ll make a sort of whistle sound when you exhale.” Hux chuckles, “or you can do it silently, like when you’re trying not to deck a fellow officer.”

“My dear General, I didn’t realize you ever had any trouble managing your frustration.” Ren teases, “I suppose I shouldn’t be in the least put off that you have it down to precise numbers.”

“Counting is supposed to help you focus on breathing instead of the things bothering you.” Hux tells him blandly, ignoring every instance in the last 36 hours where he very clearly had trouble managing his emotions.

“And this works, does it?”

“Well, I never hit you did i?”

Ren laughs, “You know you did, it was even a little painful.”

Hux sighs loudly, “I mean  _before_  that time,” he rolls over and props his head up on his hand and waits for their eyes to meet before speaking again, “I just want you to try it and if you still feel panicky about me leaving you in the future tell yourself as many times as you need to that I do care about you and want you near, you  _know_  I do. If that doesn’t help then call me and ask me to tell you. You don’t have to accuse me of leaving you or hating you for me to tell you that I care. I might…I’m not that great with explaining my feelings and I might not realize that’s what you need at first but I’ll try. If you need me to, I’ll try. Casual affection isn’t something I’ve had a lot of experience with and I’m not…I don’t want to compromise how our men see us as individuals by appearing as- as we are now, to them. We deserve their respect and we’ve earned it and I don’t want them to think that we’re defecting from Snoke for mundane or emotional reasons.” Hux groans and falls face first onto the mattress, “I’m babbling.”  _Where is your eloquence Hux? You think about this stuff all the time, why can’t you turn those thoughts into verbal_ sense. _This is why Ma always told you that emotions were an asteroid field and should be avoided at all costs. It makes you stupid, you sound like an infant. Its not-_

“-sooner.”

Hux jerks his head up as he catches the tail end of Ren’s sentence, “Pardon?”

Ren smirks, “I  _said_ sometimes I wish I had known this side of you much sooner.”

“Which side?”

“The side that  _isn’t_  an uptight, arrogant perfectionist that finds any kind of chaos in your general vicinity unpalatable.”

Hux cocks an eyebrow, “I hadn’t been aware that your opinion of me had changed so drastically in the past year. Nor that it had been so low in the first place.”

Ren laughs and rolls over until he’s perched on top of a frowning Hux, he’s still chuckling when he presses a quick kiss to the General’s lower lip, “My opinion of  _General_  Hux hasn’t changed. You’re still an uptight, arrogant perfectionist when you’re in your uniform and your hair is in place and everyone calls you ‘Sir’. But-”

Ren cuts himself off so he can kiss Hux thoroughly and run his fingers through damp ginger locks. When he pulls back Hux looks somewhere between confused, irritated and stunned.

“ _But”_ Ren continues, “When we’re here you aren’t ‘General Hux’. I’ll admit I hadn’t expected to find a man with a sense of humour or any kind of humanity underneath all of that hair product. If I had I might have made an effort to stop antagonizing you years ago.”

“Wait, were you-you were antagonizing me on purpose?” Hux snaps, “why would you- the entire purpose of us being stationed- what did you have to gain from  _pissing me off_?”

Ren frowns in confusion, “Snoke had charged me with keeping an eye on you when our tasks brought us in close proximity. He didn’t trust your ambition – he encouraged me to undermine your authority as some sort of reminder to your men that you weren’t omnipotent, that there was a higher power above you.” He smirks, “You can’t say he was wrong to be concerned.”

“Oh and it was all Snoke’s idea was it?”

“Well…you were really,  _really_ , arrogant.”

“You were childish and obnoxious and a hazard to the sanity and safety of – Mmpf!”

Ren nipped at Hux’s bottom lip before pulling away with a grin, “we’ve been here before  _General_. Let’s not do it again.”

Hux huffs, petulantly folds his arms across his chest despite the man lying on top of him and glares, “if you hadn’t been an absolute menace I _might_  have been alright with your company when we first met. He was obviously playing us against each other, why else would he tell me who your parents were; who your uncle was? He wanted me to believe there was something to watch for; he let me  _know_ you struggled with balancing the force. He led me to believe you were a risk.” Hux breathes a laugh, “it’s brilliant really, the way he played us off of each other. If we’re too busy antagonizing one another how would we ever find the time to turn against him?”

Ren sits up, frowning, “You admire him?”

Hux snorts and pulls Ren back down, “of course not. He was clever in keeping us from uniting, but he made a disastrous mistake in sending you back to me broken and expecting me to kill you. He must have been relying on my anger over Starkiller being focused on you. Human emotion can’t be predicted and I’m rather offended he thought he had that good of a read on me.”

“You do realize that I did make an attempt to get on your good side when I returned, right?”

Hux tilts his head to the side, “you were more…amicable when you returned to the Finalizer. You did that on purpose?”

Ren snorts, “Of course I did. We both know he had sent me to the Finalizer as one last test of my worth. I was hoping you might report more favourably regarding me if I was less…irritating. I hadn’t intended to be anything more than useful to you. I had been under the impression that he viewed you as an asset to the First Order, but he may have just wanted me to think that.” Ren sighed and lay his head on Hux’s chest “I don’t know what he really thought about either of us. You know I can’t tell the difference between things I wanted to see from him and things that he led me to believe – much less things that might have been true.”

“I know,” Hux murmurs and runs his fingers through Ren’s hair. He shuffles to the side the more the Knight relaxes, until Ren is only laying on half of him and he can trail his fingers over the muscles in Ren’s arms and still breathe at the same time.

“I was surprised when you seemed to find me amusing.” Ren smiles, “then I realized I also found you amusing… and witty. Then we were on Reecee and it was the first time I had ever seen you out of your uniform and looking anything less than the toy soldier I still thought you were. I remember being surprised at how light your hair really was in the sun and how pale you were. You were human, and it was distracting. I gave you my cowl because I didn’t want anyone else to see you that way, to recognize you.” Ren snorts, “That was a terrible idea on my part, the cowl just made me feel like I had staked a claim on you. And it made you look paler, more innocent. I wanted to see you wearing nothing but that while I rode you.”

Hux groans loudly at the imagery, “Dammit, Ren. We have had sex three times in the last day and a half. Stop it.”

Ren laughs and strokes the inside of Hux’s thigh with one of his hands, “but the month and a half before that we didn’t have sex at all.”

Hux slaps his hand and tries to wiggle away but Ren grabs a hold of the waist of Hux’s boxers so that the General risks tearing his underwear or losing them completely if he keeps trying to get free.

“I don’t think I’m physically capable of having sex again right now you insatiable bastard.” Hux grunts and kicks his legs out at the Knight, dislodging the hand he quickly flips onto his stomach so he can crawl to the other side of the bed and get free.

Ren, of course, is having none of it. For the first time since they’ve known each other the Knight uses the force against Hux and pins his hands to the mattress. Immediately the General ceases his struggles and his shoulders jerk as he tries to tug his hands free.

“Are you,” Hux swallows, “are you actually using the force on me right now?”

His boxers had ridden down his hips during the struggle and Ren the swell where Hux’s butt-cheek meets his lower back “Is that a problem?” he asks.

Hux blinks and considers the question, tugging once more, just to be certain that he really couldn’t move his hands. “This doesn’t seem like a proper use of the force.”

Ren smiles and pushes Hux’s black undershirt up, following the exposed spine with his tongue and lips. When he reaches the other man’s shoulders he pauses, “if I’m to be your consort it seems like this would be the _only_  proper use of the force.”

Hux frowns, mildly distracted and incredibly confused, “I don’t…are we…what?”

“If you want me to stop, say the word Hux.”

Taking a deep breath Hux shifts and has to concede that he  _is_  getting turned on by all of this. Whether it’s Ren’s usual effect or the blatant abuse of a power Hux would never understand he couldn’t say.

He pushes himself up just slightly, pressing into the warm body on top of his and sighs, “You aren’t nearly dressed up enough to be my consort.”

“No?” Ren laughs, pushing Hux’s shirt over his head and sucking on his shoulder blades between words, “I would think a consort would be better naked.”

Hux hums, “a consort would be there for my pleasure, both sexually and aesthetically. You would wear a collar of crystal, from jaw to collarbone. Silver chains would connect it to the rubies and diamonds spanning your shoulders, drawing attention to your physical strength. One of those chains would be studded with diamonds and would lead down the centre of your chest and back to a chain wrapped tightly around your waist; something I could yank you around with when you didn’t feel like listening. We both know there isn’t any universe out there where you would always be obedient.”

Ren flips Hux over and straddles his hips, grinding down on his slowly hardening length. He smirks knowingly, “thought about this much, have you?”

Hux grins back, something dark and promising sparking in his eyes and a tremor runs across Ren’s body. Hux’s voice is deep and husky when he speaks, “You have no idea.”

Ren lowers himself to lick at the glinting barbells in Hux’s nipples, “I should have known you would have a preference for shiny things. I would have expected gold.”

“Silver would look better on you.” Hux tells him, “silver and red stones and sheer black fabric to cover the bits I really don’t want to share with anybody else. And, of course, bare hands. I would want everyone to see your hands and know that I’m the only person you’re allowed to touch. I’d want you to shimmer as you sauntered across the throne room and kneel at my feet and have everyone in the galaxy see how gorgeous you are and know that you are mine.”

 Ren groans and grinds their hips together until Hux is fully hard and meeting each thrust as much as he can. Ren releases Hux’s wrist in order to snatch the shirt off of his arms and quickly pins them back down. Then he climbs off the bed and kicks off his own underwear artlessly, when he sees Hux wriggling his hips as though he wishes to remove his own he pins his hips to the bed with the force as well and huffs a laugh when Hux groans.

“This is ridiculous.” Hux says, “Blasphemous? Is this blasphemy?”

“Who cares?” Ren laughs and kneels on the bed with Hux’s waist between his thighs.

Hux moans when Ren starts coating his own fingers in oil. They have lube, because Hux doesn’t like how difficult it is to wash away the oil afterwards – but Ren loves the way it feels and with the way Hux is pinned to the bed he knows he’s about to be treated to a hell of a sight. And if his ability to remain coherent when he’s being held down by the force instead of Ren’s hands is any indication, he’s going to be able to perfectly enjoy this.

There’s just one problem.

“Ren,” Hux croaks, his eyes following the oil slicked hand as Ren reaches behind himself, his stomach stretching beautifully, “Ren, I’m still-” he cuts himself off to listen to Ren's gasp as he penetrates himself and Hux  _knows_  Ren’s doing it on purpose, he  _knows_  that Ren is still stretched from the rough fucking Hux gave him yesterday and that his own fingers probably aren’t giving him anything worth gasping over. “Ren, for fucks sake, take off my-”

Ren opens his eyes and looks down at Hux, an arrogant smirk on his face and he thrusts back onto his own hand, his cock bobbing obscenely and his abdominal muscles clenching hard. Hux strains against the force holding him down and growls as he watches that majestically scarred skin stretch taught over dancing muscles, ribs expanding and drawing attention to erect nipples and goose-pimpled flesh.

Hux labours to wrench himself free from something he can’t even visualize and Ren laughs at his efforts,  _the filthy tease_.

“A consort would put on a show, would he not?” he questions amorously.

“A consort would not torment his Emperor.” Hux snaps back, eyes glued to Ren’s body.

Ren pulls his hand free and leans over the General on one elbow, keeping his wet hand from touching the duvet. He hovers over Hux’s lips expectantly and when he strains to reach Ren pulls away before he can with a chuckle.

“Ah, but the Emperor has not given his consort any jewels.” Ren pushes himself up and languidly strokes his own cock with his oiled fingers, “the Emperor’s consort is feeling a little underappreciated at the moment.”

Hux snaps his eyes to Ren’s, “How long do you think you can hold me down while you touch yourself?” he snarls, lust and frustration distorting his voice, “how far are you going to push me before I get free? Can you keep me here while you come? Can you keep me here and get across the ship before you let go?”

Ren moans quietly and his hips jerk into his fist, “Why would I need to go that far before I free you Hux?”

“If you leave me here like this I will  _destroy_  you when I am free.”

Ren grins maniacally and let’s go of his cock in favour of shoving Hux’s boxers down far enough to reveal his neglected erection and barely swipes enough oil over it before he’s taking the General as deep as he’ll go. He grinds his hips down hard and groans loudly, eyes cracked open just enough to watch Hux gasp and hold his breath.

With a quiet whimper Hux starts breathing again and opens his eyes just in time to catch Ren leaning forward and taking Hux’s hair in hand, forcing his head back and stretching his neck out. His hips are still being held down by the force so he can’t thrust up into that wet heat but he quickly finds that Ren is more than capable of fucking himself on his cock and he has never enjoyed the feeling of being used quite this much before.

Hux quickly gets lost in the motion of Ren riding him and the sharp prick of teeth on his neck. He manages to demand that Ren come first and opens his eyes to watch the Knight leaning over him, fisting his own cock and riding Hux’s, biting his lip and grunting with each thrust. His hair is sticking to his temples and the sheen of sweat on lightly bronzed skin only accentuates the contortion of what must be sore muscles with each jerky movement. Hux has a moment to mourn his inability to touch and then Ren is clenching around him and grinding almost painfully down on his hips. The heat of semen hitting his chest reminds Hux of the warmth he felt under his ribs that morning and then he’s coming and his shoulders are lifting off the mattress because he still can’t use his hands and his throat hurts when he settles back down and he thinks he might have screamed.

When he looks up Ren’s hair is damp and he’s panting like he’s run a marathon and Hux has never found him more beautiful. The Knight is crouched over him and his arms are shaking with the effort of holding himself up but his tawny eyes are burning holes in Hux’s own and he wants nothing more than to brush the hair sticking to Ren’s face out of the way and bury his nose in the space behind the knights ear so that he can fill all of his senses with the other man, but his damned hands are still being pinned down.

He makes a show of trying to tug his arms free, “Ren.” he reminds.

Ren smiles and Hux is finally free. He doesn’t waste a second before burying his hands in damp hair and pushing Ren onto his back so he can kiss him properly.

... . -.-. --- -. -.. / ... - . .--. ... 

It’s the beginning of nightshift that same day when Hux’s vacation is cut short. He and Ren have somehow managed to fit both of themselves in the General’s bathtub and Ren is dozing while Hux massages his scalp instead of washing his hair like he had intended on doing.

They had spent the afternoon in the Knight’s chambers so he could work on building another comm while Hux lazed about and tried not to think about the things he could be doing or plans he could be making. Ren threw screws and other bits of metal at him every time Hux’s anxiety increased until he grew frustrated and shoved his personal datapad in Hux’s hands and told him to read a novel or play a game.

“Do a math test on the HoloNet or something if you would find that more entertaining. Just…distract yourself, Hux. This is your down-time – take advantage of it.”

Hux had been so offended by the mess of applications and files on Ren’s datapad that he had spent the afternoon organizing it, improving a program he installed that would make it easier to find the apps that weren’t immediately visible and then fell asleep admiring his own work. His feeling of accomplishment wasn’t to be hampered by Ren’s loud complaints about how he knew where everything had been and he grinned the entire time the Knight pouted. He managed to appease Ren’s mood by offering to wash his hair that night.

So they sat in an obnoxious looking – but surprisingly comfortable – heap in the black plasteel bathtub. Hux had one leg hanging out the side and the other pressed against the wall by Ren’s ribs so that the Knight could lay with his back against Hux’s chest. In the half hour they had been lounging in the tub Ren had slowly slid down so that his head was on Hux’s chest and his feet were propped up on the wall, crossed at the ankles. The General didn’t think it looked comfortable, but Ren’s shoulders kept twitching like they did when he was falling asleep and he was breathing so deeply that he was nearly snoring.

Hux is looking absently at the wall with his fingers pushing through sudsy hair to scratch gently at the crown of Ren’s head when his datapad starts screeching from where he had left it on the coffee table.

He barely has time to look towards the door before there is a pressure at his back pushing him forward and the bathing paraphernalia they had set on the lip of the tub is thrown against the wall. Ren tries to sit up only to avoid falling further into the water by Hux’s knees catching him.

“-The fuck?” Ren grunts, sitting up more carefully this time and scowling back at Hux when the General pushes at him so that he can get out of the bath faster, “what’s happening?”

“If you would get out of the way, I could find out.” Hux snaps, slipping a little when he puts a foot on the wet floor and snatches a towel from where it landed in the sink. He hears a splash and turns back to see Ren quickly rinsing his hair in what’s left of the bathwater.

Then he has his datapad in hand, ensuring he doesn’t drip water on it, and the noise stops: leaving a blinking message from Lt Mitaka telling him that he has an urgent message regarding Torstein.

It’s only a matter of seconds before he has Mitaka on the line – sans video because he really doesn’t think his Lieutenant would enjoy seeing him naked – and is demanding to know what is going on.

“Captain Phasma is requesting permission to return to the Finalizer – “Mitaka says on a single breath, “The shuttles sent to the Citadel were set to return last night but they haven’t arrived yet. Phasma had us track their signature and they’re still operational – so we know they haven’t been destroyed in transit – but they haven’t left the Citadel. Captain Phasma says-“

“-They’re never late.” Hux finishes for him, keeping his cursing to himself, “Approve Captain Phasma’s return, get her here as soon as possible. I want a history of the movements of those shuttles sent to my datapad and inform Azha that there will be an emergency meeting upon Phasma’s arrival. Begin executing ‘Substantial Threat Level’ protocols for the Finalizer.”

“Yes, sir.” Mitaka replies briskly, “anything else?”

Hux scowls as he kicks open his closet, “Inform the Subsidizer that I will be contacting Admiral Starling within the hour and that they are to enact ‘Severe Threat Level’ protocols. Have Admiral Turner report to my office; I expect to meet him there in twenty minutes. Deploy thirty percent of the Finalizer tie-fighters to the Subsidizer and send several squadrons of troopers to Torstein.”

“Should we set course for Torstein? If they are in danger-”

“If they’re attacked then we can’t put ourselves in the line of fire directly and we can’t leave ourselves vulnerable to attack here either. This is the base of operations, Lieutenant – It won’t matter what happens to them if the Finalizer goes down; Snoke would have them destroyed for defecting regardless.”

“Understood, sir.”

“Thank you, Lieutenant.”

Still scowling Hux ends the call and pulls a uniform out of his closet to toss on the bed before drying himself off more effectively. He nearly jumps out of his skin when Ren speaks up from where he’s leaning against the doorframe in just a towel.

“I want to go.”

“What?” Hux snaps, “go where?”

Ren frowns, “To Torstein.”

“You just came  _back_  from Torstein.”

“Oh yes, I had nearly forgotten, it having been so long since I’ve been back and all.” The knight raises an eyebrow when Hux throws his towel to the floor angrily and starts getting dressed with sharp, jerky movements. “I could be an asset to them if I was there while they were attacked. I can’t exactly be of much use to anybody from here.”

Hux refuses to say having Ren stay on the Finalizer would be useful to  _him_. He would figure out precisely why the idea of Ren leaving again burned so much when he had less pressing matters to attend to. That being said…

“You won’t be of any use to us here if  _we_  are attacked and you’re 22 hours away.”

Ren sighs and pulls Hux’s hands away from where he is doing up his shirt, “You will have Phasma here, besides which you and I both know that wherever I am will draw more fire from Snoke. He didn’t want me outside of his control, he wanted me  _dead_. That I’m not dead but not following his orders is probably eating away at him – he’ll target me over you.”

Hux huffs and tries a different angle, “You haven’t been on the field in months.”

Ren laughs and let’s go of the General so he can finish getting dressed, “Did you think I’ve spent this entire time neglecting my training? I’ll be fine – I’ve been fighting for more than a decade.”

“Why now?” Hux asks while he settles his uniform, keeping his eyes on the lines of his coat. “You seemed content to leave the fighting to others and do other things.”

“I was.” Ren shrugs, “it was fine; not very exciting though. I wished to explore avenues other than that which I was raised to do, and I did. Now I would like to do both; I’m entirely capable of finishing the one Kyber Comm unit I have left  _and_  killing the people threatening to end your rebellion.”

Hux takes a steadying breath and reminds himself that he knows all this, he  _knows_  and he doesn’t have time to dwell on it because he has a job to do. Ren needs to go – his mere presence could put the odds in their favour if any battle takes place. And if he wants to go then there is no reason to keep him here.

_Except he just came back and you would really like more time to be lazy and unproductive with him before real life-_

“Hux.” Ren says softly and runs his cursed hands through the General’s damp hair, “it’ll be fine. I’ll come back and you’ll probably be pissed off about something and you’ll take the extra blanket off your bed because it’ll be too warm with me in it with you.”

“There isn’t an extra blanket on my bed.” Hux says mildly.

Ren smirks, “no, but you always complain about it being cold when I’m not around. I’m going to bring the blanket from my rooms here before I leave.” he kisses Hux thoroughly, careful not to disturb his uniform, before continuing, “you have about 8 minutes to do your hair and get to your office, General. Your people are waiting.”

Hux frowns but nods, “You said you have one Kyber Comm left to make; do you have ones that are functioning?”

“Yes.”

“Keep one on your person. I will not be pleased if I lose contact with you during a battle. This entire situation is going to be a nightmare.”

Ren laughs, “Yes,  _sir!_  I can probably put together an ear piece for it and everything, just for you General.”

Hux groans “Don’t be formal when you’re half naked. It’s indecent.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ┻━┻︵ \\(°□°)/ ︵ ┻━┻  
> So I realized while writing this chapter that I never even considered the use of hyper-drives and shit when travelling on space craft. I goofed but it’s so intrinsic to how the story flows so far that I can’t fix it. So, unfortunately, there are no such things as hyper-drives in this universe. Nobody can travel at light speed and here’s to hoping I can avoid any and all problems leaving out this small detail might have on any naval battles I write.
> 
> Also, because god forbid I put up a chapter without a [link, here’s](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UK_Threat_Levels#Threat_levels) one to the Threat Levels protocols – ish. I based it on the UK alert states because the First Order seems to be mostly British.
> 
> And thats all she [aka, me] wrote. I didn't like the idea of leaving a work unfinished while posted so i had originally deleted it. To all the people that originally commented and liked it i took a screenshot of your comments and kudos so i wouldn't forget because i really appreciated it.  
> <3

**Author's Note:**

> Join me on [Tumblr](http://crownbeed.tumblr.com/)  
> Want to share this story on Tumblr? [Click Here](http://couronnebead.tumblr.com/post/142995621528/aesthetic-for-second-steps-supreme-leader)


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